The StandDown Texas Project

More Commentary From David Love

"Putting the Brakes on Philly's Death Penalty," is David Love's latest essay at Huffington Post.  Here's an extended excerpt from the beginning of this must-read:

Witness to Innocence is a national organization originally founded as a project of Sister Helen Prejean of the book Dead Man Walking. Our mission is to empower exonerated death row survivors and their loved ones to become leaders in the death penalty abolition movement. We provide a support network for our members, each of whom spent an average of 10 years on death row for a crime they did not commit.

WTI members speak to audiences throughout the country about their experiences on death row, testify before state legislatures, work with state abolition groups and change hearts and minds in the process. WTI has been involved in successful death penalty repeal efforts in six states over six years.

In Maryland, my advocacy director Kirk Bloodsworth and I stood with Gov. Martin O'Malley as he signed the state's death penalty repeal bill into law. We stood with abolitionists and Democratic and Republican lawmakers in Annapolis who realize the death penalty doesn't work. The government should not be in the business of killing people, and we oppose executions under any circumstances. Capital punishment is expensive, and discriminates against the poor and people of color. And most of all, innocent people are put to death.

So, why are we here? WTI decided to convene the Philadelphia Moratorium Campaign, a diverse coalition of religious leaders, human rights and civil liberties organizations, prisoners' rights groups, legal defense organizations, community groups and others.

We are calling on Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams to place a moratorium on death penalty prosecutions in this city. In addition, we are planning a public outreach campaign, in which death row exonerees will go out to the communities in this city, talk to the people and to lawmakers and educate them about the problems with the death penalty.

Once again, why are we here today? We are here because Pennsylvania is a leader in the death penalty. About 200 people are on death row, fourth behind California, Florida and Texas.

Earlier commentary from David Love begins at the link.

Scott Christianson on a California Legislator's Push to Bring Back Gas

The Sacramento Bee publishes an OpEd, "DAs push for return of the gas chamber," by Scott Christianson, a former New York state criminal justice official.  He's also the author of The Last Gasp: The Rise and Fall of the American Gas Chamber.

State lawmakers are scheduled to conduct a public hearing Tuesday on legislation to overhaul California's dysfunctional system for carrying out legal executions. Much of the proposal is old news, but there is one as-yet unnoticed feature that merits close attention.

California's district attorneys want to bring back the gas chamber. Really. While the plan stands little chance of passage, it reveals just how desperate and out of touch the pro-capital punishment forces have become.

Since 1967, despite spending many hundreds of millions of dollars on the death penalty, California has put to death a grand total of 13 people – two by a procedure of lethal gas that was struck down by the federal courts in the 1990s and the last 11 by a protocol of lethal injection that remains stymied in the courts. Not surprisingly, public opinion has been turning against capital punishment: Last November 48 percent of the electorate voted for Proposition 34, which would have ended the practice.

And:

The use of nitrogen for execution purposes was first suggested in a brief article that appeared in a conservative magazine in September 1995. In it, Stuart A. Creque, a Bay Area freelance writer, called nitrogen asphyxiation a "perfect method of execution," saying nitrogen is "cheap and universally available" material that requires no special safety precautions, and claiming that it would cause painless death without any trauma or damage to human organs.

In 2011 this method was further recommended by Kent Scheidegger, the legal director of the Sacramento-based Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a conservative public interest law organization that often collaborates with prosecutors to champion the most punitive responses to crime.

In his blog, Scheidegger stated, "The problem with the gas chamber was not the method but the choice of gas." He advocated the use of helium or nitrogen.

"I do not need reports or studies to know that hypoxia is painless," he wrote. All that is necessary, he said, "is retrofit the gas chamber to flush it with helium or nitrogen."

How many appellate judges, scientists or engineers would agree with either of those facile assertions? California law prohibits gassing for euthanasia of dogs or cats. Veterinarians considered it too cruel. But using it on humans would be OK?

Earlier coverage of the California legislation begins at the link; more on Scott Christianson's book, at the link.

New Challenge to Arkansas' New Lethal Injection Law

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports, "6 on death row sue, say drugs a gamble," by John Lynch.

Six death row inmates sued the state Friday, claiming that Arkansas' new lethal injection procedure probably will not kill them.

In a lawsuit filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court, inmates Jason McGehee, Stacey Eugene Johnson, Jack Harold Jones, Bruce Earl Ward, Kenneth Williams, and Marcel Williams ask the court to declare the new procedure illegal and block the Arkansas Department of Corrections from using it.

The new lethal injection procedure relies on an untested drug barred by federal regulators, the inmates claim in their lawsuit.

The plan, which would use an anti-anxiety drug followed by a barbiturate, is more likely to induce uncontrollable behavioral disturbances and inflict brain damage on inmates than it is to execute them, the convicted killers argue in the 34-page suit.

They contend the drug combination is the equivalent of a science experiment, which renders it illegal.

"There is little to no data about how this combination of drugs given in this quantity will affect the prisoners," attorney Jeff Rosenzweig wrote in the lawsuit.  "The 2013 Lethal Injection Procedure is totally novel and essentially amounts to carrying out an experiment on the prisoners.

"Under its new statutory authority to choose from a broad range of drugs, the [state] has chosen in its 2013 Lethal Injection Procedure a completely untried combination and quantity of drugs that will take hours to be injected and to reach their peak effect, that will produce agonizing and degrading effects during the procedure and that will severely and permanently injure - but may not kill - the prisoners," the lawsuit adds.

And:

The case was assigned to Circuit Judge Tim Fox, who presided over the last two death row legal challenges to lethal injection procedures.

"Death-row inmates sue to void new lethal-injection law," is the Arkansas News Bureau report.

A lawsuit filed Friday on behalf of six condemned killers contends Arkansas’ new lethal injection law is unconstitutional and seeks to block executions.

The lawsuit filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court contends that the new law, adopted this year in response to a state Supreme Court decision that declared a 2009 law unconstitutional, violates death-row inmates’ right to die quickly by allowing prison officials to use a slow-acting barbiturate in a mix of chemicals for lethal injections.

The law in effect when the crimes were committed required the state to use fast-acting chemicals, and the new law violates “the well-settled state law principle that a sentence must be in accordance with the statutes in effect on the date of the crime,” according to the lawsuit.

The new execution procedure authorized in Act 139, the 2013 Method of Execution Act, permits use of an anti-anxiety drug and phenobarbital, a slow-acting barbiturate. The lawsuit termed the concoction “a completely untried combination and quantity of drugs that will take hours to be injected and to reach their peak effect, that will produce agonizing and degrading effects during the procedure, and that will severely and permanently injure — but may not kill — the prisoners.”

“We’re asking for a declaration that the new statute and the procedures that have been promulgated under it are unconstitutional and illegal, and we’re asking a judge to prohibit any executions,” said Little Rock lawyer Jeff Rosenzweig.

The AP filing is, "Inmates: New Ark. execution law unconstitutional," by Chuck Bartels, via the San Francisco Chronicle.

Arkansas' just-approved execution law is as badly flawed as the version it replaced, according to a lawsuit filed Friday that argues the new law is unconstitutional and puts inmates at risk for an agonizing death.

The lawsuit was filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court on behalf of six death row inmates who argue that the law approved by legislators last month still violates existing law and is unconstitutional. The Arkansas Supreme Court last year tossed out the state's previous execution law, saying the Legislature had ceded too much control to Correction Department administrators in carrying out executions.

Arkansas hasn't executed an inmate since 2005 due to court challenges, and inmates' attorney Jeff Rosenzweig said he expects this legal effort to kick around the courts for quite a while.

"I think these are meritorious claims that I think will take the courts a while to sort out. We're dealing with a brand new statute, new procedures and a lot of complicated evidentiary issues," Rosenzweig said.

The suit argues that the new procedures from the Legislature call for the use of an anti-anxiety drug and phenobarbital, a slow-acting barbiturate, in "a completely untried combination and quantity of drugs that will take hours to be injected and to reach their peak effect, that will produce agonizing and degrading effects during the procedure, and that will severely and permanently injure — but may not kill — the prisoners."

Earlier coverage of Arkansas lethal injection issues begins at the link.

California Appeals Court Hears Lethal Injection Challenge

The Silicon Valley Mercury News reports, "Court hears challenge to California's execution method," by Howard Mintz.

A state appeals court hearing here Tuesday underscored the extent to which California's death penalty system has been lost in the legal weeds.

During less than an hour of arguments, the 1st District Court of Appeal offered few hints on whether it would uphold a Marin County judge's 2011 order blocking executions because state prison officials failed to comply with complex administrative rules in revising California's three-drug lethal injection procedures. The highly technical issue is the latest legal impediment for the state, which has not carried out an execution in more than seven years.

Justice J. Anthony Kline was the only member of the panel to signal where he stands in the case,

indicating the prison department's effort to overhaul its execution method was botched.

"The amount of conceded mistakes here is unusual," Kline told Deputy Attorney General Michael Quinn.

But Justices James Lambden and James Richman were silent during the hearing, asking no questions of either side. The court now has 90 days to rule.

While the outcome rests on arcane legal rules, the result could be important for the pace of California's execution process. If the appeals court sides with the state, allowing the three-drug method to move forward, it might prompt resolution of related federal court challenges to lethal injection -- possibly allowing executions to proceed next year. But a loss for the state would likely add to the interminable delays on the 734-inmate death row.

"Court In SF Hears Bid To Reinstate Lethal Injection Protocol," is by Julia Cheever of Bay City News, via the San Francisco Appeal.

A lawyer for the state asked an appeals court in San Francisco today to reinstate California’s three-drug lethal-injection procedure for executing death row inmates.

Deputy California Attorney General Michael Quinn argued that the revised lethal-injection plan, completed in 2010, complied with a state administrative law governing the development of new regulations.

Public comments on the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s draft of the protocol in 2009 “dealt with every conceivable issue related to the death penalty,” Quinn told a three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeal.

“There was no confusion about what the draft regulation was about.

The public was fully informed and able to comment,” Quinn maintained.

The state is appealing a 2011 decision in which Marin County Superior Court Faye D’Opal struck down the revised protocol on the ground that the CDCR violated the state’s Administrative Procedure Act.

The law requires agencies to show that new regulations are necessary and to provide a meaningful opportunity for public comment.

D’Opal ruled that among other errors, the department failed to justify why its three-drug plan was better and more effective than an alternative of using just one drug, a barbiturate.

Steven Mayer, a lawyer for condemned inmate Mitchell Sims, argued today, “At the end of the day, when you get to the heart of the case—which is the three-drug protocol—it is totally unclear why the three drugs were adopted.”

Earlier coverage of California lethal injection issues begins at the link.

What's Next for California

"California's dormant death penalty system faces another legal test," is the title of Howard Mintz' report in the Silicon Valley Mercury News.

Now more than seven years since the last execution in California, the state this week will try again to revive its dormant death penalty system in an appeals court considering the latest legal tangle over San Quentin's lethal injection procedures.

In a hearing Tuesday, the 1st District Court of Appeal will review a Marin County judge's 2011 order stopping executions because prison officials failed to comply with administrative rules in revising California's three-drug execution method. The Brown administration appealed the ruling, likely assuring the state will not execute anyone this year on its 734-inmate death row.

Even as the appeal proceeds, prison officials continue to craft a new execution procedure that would rely on a single drug to put condemned killers to death, similar to methods other states such as Arizona, Washington and Ohio set up to short-circuit challenges to the three-drug procedures. A prison spokeswoman said last week there is no timetable for adopting a single-drug method.

But California appears a long way from resolving a morass of state and federal legal battles over lethal injection.

Switching to the single-drug approach would likely require a new round of administrative hearings, which could take a year or more. Resolution of the legal battle in the 1st District would only pave the way for a return to the federal courts, which first put executions on hold in 2006. And states across the country, including California, are facing fresh problems over a shortage of drugs used in executions, and questions over whether they've obtained them legally from overseas manufacturers.

Syndicated columnist Tim Rutten writes, "California on track to stop killing its own."  It's via the San Gabriel Valley Tribune.

Last November, California came surprisingly close to becoming the sixth state in the past five years to abolish the death penalty, when voters rejected a proposition on the question, 52.7 percent to 47.3 percent. That result represented a nearly 19 percent decline in support for executions from 1976, when 71 percent of the state's voters approved a referendum re-establishing capital punishment. Nationally, in fact, both the number of death sentences imposed and the number of executions carried out has declined steadily since their high point in 1999 and reached new lows in each of the past four years.

Some of this reluctance to engage in legal killing comes, of course, from moral scruple. Many others have followed the sobering number of wrongful convictions revealed by new forensic technologies such as DNA identification, and concluded that no process as clearly fallible as our criminal justice system ought to be empowered to impose an irrevocable sanction, like death. Others have become acquainted with the racial disparities that continue to characterize death sentences across the country and concluded that capital punishment's tendency to erode constitutional guarantees of equal protection under the law simply aren't eradicable.

Others have come to agree with former U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, who in 2008 wrote that three decades of service on the court had lead him to conclude that his vote to reinstate executions was a mistake. "I have relied on my own experience," Stevens wrote, "in reaching the conclusion that the imposition of the death penalty represents the pointless and needless extinction of life with only marginal contributions to any discernible social or public purposes." A criminal punishment with "such negligible returns to the State is patently excessive and cruel," he concluded.

Earlier coverage from California begins at the link; you can also jump directly to California lethal injection issues.

Death Penalty Politics in Virginia

The Charlottesville Daily Progress reports, "Commonwealth's attorney candidate: No dealth penalty in Charlottesville if elected."

A candidate for Charlottesville commonwealth's attorney plans to place a moratorium on death penalty prosecutions if elected, and he's bringing his campaign to Random Row Books on Tuesday.

Steve Deaton, who served as the city's top prosecutor from 1990 to 1994, called capital murder charges "barbaric" and using them to negotiate a plea deal "immoral" in a release announcing the event, which will take place at 7 p.m. 

And:

Deaton will face off against incumbent commonwealth's attorney Warner D. Chapman in a June 11 Democratic primary. No republican candidates have announced plans to run in November's general election.

Earlier coverage from Virginia begins at the link.

North Carolina Legislature on Path to Rescind RJA

AP posts, "NC Senate panel backs execution rule changes."  It's by Gary D. Robertson, via WBNS-TV.

A Senate judiciary panel on Tuesday approved a Republican effort members say will kick-start the resumption of North Carolina executions after more than six years and help end a method for death-row prisoners seeking life sentences on racial bias claims.

The committee voted along party lines in favor of the measure that its chief sponsor says will ensure justice is carried out for those convicted of heinous murders. The full Senate could hear the bill later this week.

No one on North Carolina's death row has been executed since 2006 because of various legal appeals.

Capital punishment "is the law of the land, and it needs to be carried out until or unless the people of North Carolina decide they do not want a death penalty," Sen. Thom Goolsby, R-New Hanover, told the panel. "We have a number of families that continue to suffer. Their dead continue to rot in their graves, and they are waiting for justice in this state."

The bill places in state law mostly technical changes in part to reflect a state Supreme Court ruling that found doctors are required to oversee executions, after a state Medical Board rule barred doctors from doing so. The bill also repeals what's left of the 2009 Racial Justice Act, which already was weakened last year by the Republican-led General Assembly.

The original Racial Justice Act allowed death-row inmates to use statistics and other evidence to persuade a judge that bias influenced their sentences. Successful cases convert their sentences to a life term without parole.

The Wilmington StarNews reports, "Bill to repeal Racial Justice Act easily passes committee," by Molly Parker.

Sen. Thom Goolsby's bill to repeal the Racial Justice Act easily passed a Senate committee Tuesday morning, but not before members heard emotional testimony from individuals on both sides of the death penalty debate.

And:

While the death penalty is legal in North Carolina, the last execution in the state was in 2006.

Goolsby, R-New Hanover, says the Racial Justice Act, passed by the General Assembly in 2009, has resulted in an end run around the death penalty – "the law of our land."

The Racial Justice Act was passed into law on the heels of the exoneration of three black men. It prohibits the seeking of the death penalty on the basis of race and allows defense attorneys to present statistical evidence to uncover patterns of racial bias. It was significantly curtailed by the General Assembly last year, strictly limiting the data that can be presented.

News 14 Carolina, the Time Warner Cable local news outlet, posts, "Bill aimed at restarting executions in NC advanced by Senate committee."

“And it wasn't until the legislature passed a law, another law, that allowed us to put DNA in a database that I was actually freed. But I went through 36 judges, and all of them denied my appeal, even though I was innocent,” said Darryl Hunt.

The full Senate is expected to debate this bill before the end of the week.

Earlier coverage from North Carolina begins at the link.  Later today, I'll be adding additional North Carolina news.  As always, thanks to Gerda Stein for distributing.

Lethal Injection Update From Arkansas

"Ark. death row inmates want execution drug records," is the AP report by Jeannie Nuss, via the San Antonio Express-News.

Six death row inmates asked a court this week to order the Arkansas Department of Correction to turn over documents about lethal injection drugs under a public records request.

Attorney Jeff Rosenzweig filed paperwork Monday in Pulaski County also asking the court to declare that all available information about the origin, history and quality of lethal injection drugs must be disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act.

"Not only the condemned people, but the people in the state of Arkansas have a right to know what's being done in their name," Rosenzweig told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

Rosenzweig said a fellow attorney, Josh Lee, asked correction spokeswoman Shea Wilson for records related to lethal injection drugs earlier this month. But according to Rosenzweig's lawsuit, Wilson said the department didn't have any new information to release under the state's new lethal injection law.

Lee wrote back to Wilson, saying he took her response to mean that she had records responsive to his request and that she was refusing to disclose them because of an FOIA exemption in the lethal injection law.

The Arkansas News Bureau reports, "Inmates seek release of information on lethal-injection drugs."

Attorney Jeff Rosenzweig said Tuesday he filed a lawsuit in Pulaski County Circuit Court on Monday after the Department of Correction did not, in his opinion, fully comply with a request submitted under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act.

A law enacted earlier this year sets forth the types of drugs that the Department of Correction can use for lethal injections. The law was a response to a state Supreme Court ruling last year that the previous lethal-injection law gave too much discretion to the DOC director, in violation of the constitutional doctrine of separation of powers.

Also, Rosenzweig and other attorneys representing a group of death-row inmates whose executions had been stayed because of the Supreme Court ruling asked the Supreme Court on Monday to deny a motion by the state to lift the stays.

Rosenzweig said it is not entirely clear whether the new lethal-injection law has cured the problems identified by the Supreme Court.

“I think most would agree it reduces the separation-of-powers problem. I don’t think it necessarily fully solves it. A court will have to decide,” he said.

Earlier coverage of Arkansas lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Developments in North Carolina

At the Charlotte Observer O-pinion site, editorial board member Fannie Flono writes, "Time to rev up N.C.'s executions? No."

It's time to juice up the needle. No more slacking off on sending the N.C. death-row inmates to the death chamber for their lethal injection.

That's the thinking behind a new bill introduced Wednesday by New Hanover Republican senator Thom Goolsby. Goolsby's Senate Bill 306 would repeal the 2009 N.C. Racial Justice Act, a law state Republicans already gutted last year. The changes drastically reduced the ability of judges to use general statistics and data to decide whether a death row inmate was given the death penalty because of his or her race. Goolsby gave his support for that revamped bill lawmakers approved, saying then that he didn't "trust statisticians or people who come in after the fact to find some way to get coldblooded killers off of death row."

But that wasn't good enough and now he's calling for the law's total revocation. His bill also calls for doctors, nurses and pharmacists to participate in executions without fear of punishment from state licensing boards, something the courts have already declared permissible. And it also requires a somewhat ghoulish death watch by lawmakers with mandated updates to the General Assembly on the status of post-conviction death penalty cases, and on the training of executioners.

And:

Instead of trying to restart the state killing industry, North Carolina should join those states abandoning it. It's too often unfairly administered even when race is not a factor.

"Bill seeks to streamline NC execution process," is the AP report filed by Michael Biesecker.  It's via the San Francisco Chronicle.

Legislation introduced Wednesday aims at streamlining the execution process in North Carolina.

The measure by Sen. Thom Goolsby, R-New Hanover, seeks to make several changes to laws governing the administration and appeal of capital punishment. It also includes doing away with the state's Racial Justice Act.

The 2009 law allows those sent to death row to seek having their sentences commuted to life in prison without the possibility of parole if they can convince a judge racial prejudice played a role in their conviction.

Flanked by prosecutors from across the state, Goolsby decried that none of the 152 inmates on North Carolina's death row have been executed since 2006 due to various state and federal legal appeals.

WRAL-TV reports, "Bill seeks to put death penalty back on track."  It's by Mark Binker.

Sen. Thom Goolsby, R-New Hanover, has filed a bill he said will end North Carolina's de facto moratorium on the death penalty. Among other measures, it would wipe away the last vestiges of the Racial Justice Act, a measure that allows death row inmates to challenge their sentences based on statistical evidence.

And:

The measure also:

• Codifies court rulings that allow doctors, nurses and other health professionals to participate in executions without sanction from the North Carolina Medical Board or other licensing bodies.
• Outlines the time line the attorney general and Division of Adult Correction has to follow once an inmate has exhausted his or her appeals.
• Provides ongoing training to execution teams.
• Requires regular reports on the status of death row cases to the General Assembly.

It's unclear how much more quickly executions would happen if Goolsby's bill passes.

"Families of Fayetteville-area murder victims support bill to repeal Racial Justice Act," is the Fayetteville Observer report by Paul Woolverton.

The families of two Fayetteville-area murder victims stood in support of legislation filed Wednesday to repeal North Carolina's Racial Justice Act and end the state's unofficial moratorium on executions.

The Racial Justice Act of 2009 and 2012 provides condemned inmates an opportunity to escape death row if they have evidence that racism was a factor in their prosecutions and convictions. It was a response to concerns of institutional racism in the criminal justice system.

Independently from the Racial Justice Act, all executions in the state were halted in January 2007 by court challenges questioning the legality and constitutionality of North Carolina's execution practices.

"The beginning of the end of that moratorium starts today," said state Sen. Thom Goolsby, a Wilmington Republican and criminal defense lawyer, during a news conference to announce his legislation.

And:

The state is still in litigation over the constitutionality of its execution procedures, whether they violate the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, said David Weiss, a lawyer with the Center for Death Penalty Litigation. Goolsby's bill would have not have an effect on that case, Weiss said, and until it's resolved, executions will remain on hold in North Carolina.

He thinks it will take at least a year.

The matter is pending before the N.C. Court of Appeals, and from there, it's expected to be heard by the N.C. Supreme Court, Weiss said.

"GOP bill would repeal Racial Justice Act once and for all," is from Raleigh's News & Observer.

SB306, filed by Sen. Thom Goolsby, a Wilmington Republican, would repeal the RJA in its entirety. Goolsby announced the bill at a news conference attended by district attorneys from around the state, and relatives of murder victims.

The bill would apparently not bring an end to the claims that have already been filed under the Racial Justice Act, however.

Goolsby said the bill would "restart the death penalty in North Carolina to ensure justice for the more than 100 families whose loved ones were taken brutally from them."

Tye Hunter, director of the Center for Death Penalty Litigation, in an interview noted that Republican legislators last session insisted they weren’t repealing the Racial Justice Act. “Now the mask is off,” Hunter said.

NC Policy Watch posts, "A return to executions?"  It's by Sarah Ovaska.

North Carolina hasn’t had an execution since 2006, and state Sen. Thom Goolsby wants to change that.

Goolsby, a Wilmington Republican, filed a bill today that seeks to repeal what’s left of the Racial Justice Act and restart executions in North Carolina.

North Carolina’s death row has 152 people on it, and the numbers of people sentenced to death has lessened in recent years. No one was sentenced to death by a North Carolina jury last year, though three people were in 2011. The longest resident of death row, Wayne Laws, has been awaiting execution since 1985.

Earlier coverage from North Carolina begins at the link. You can also jump directly to earlier news of the state's Racial Justice Act.

As always with news from North Carolina, thanks to Gerda Stein for distributing.

Maryland Senate Floor Debate May Come Next Week

Today's Annapolis Capital Gazette reports, "Death penalty repeal vote may not happen until next week," by Alex Jackson.

Gov. Martin O'Malley's bill to repeal the death penalty could wait until next week for a vote by the full Senate.

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr., D-Calvert, said Senate Bill 276 won't be discussed by the chamber until Thursday afternoon, at the earliest.

With debate continuing on O'Malley's gun-control proposal into Thursday morning, Miller said there most likely wouldn't be time for senators to propose amendments to the bill until Friday. The Senate had originally scheduled the start of debate on the death penalty repeal bill for Wednesday.

The Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee last week voted 6-5 to approve the repeal bill, which would make Maryland the 18th state to outlaw capital punishment.

Twenty-four votes are needed to pass a bill in the Senate The bill has at least 25 supporters.

"Poll: Most Marylanders back O’Malley on gun laws but not on repeal of the death penalty," is by Aaron C. Davis and Peyton M. Craighill for the Washington Post.  Infographics on the polling results are also available from the Post.

Marylanders overwhelmingly support Gov. Martin O’Malley’s plan to force gun buyers to submit to some of the nation’s strictest licensing requirements, including fingerprinting and safety training, according to a new Washington Post poll.

But a majority oppose O’Malley’s bid to abolish the death penalty, despite deep skepticism across the state about whether capital punishment is an effective deterrent, the poll found.

The mixed verdict on two of the governor’s leading priorities comes at a key juncture in the 90-day legislative session for O’Malley (D), who is trying to cement his progressive legacy in Maryland as he eyes a possible run for national office in 2016.

Across the state, fully 85 percent back the governor’s licensing plan — the centerpiece of a broader gun-control bill — and 73 percent do so “strongly,” according to the poll.

On Tuesday, the state Senate opened what promises to be several days of contentious debate on the legislation, which would also ban high-capacity ammunition clips and assault weapons — provisions that also enjoy broad support in the Post poll.

And:

Although a majority of Marylanders continue to support the death penalty, some of the arguments O’Malley is making appear to resonate.

By nearly 2 to 1, those polled say that the death penalty is not a deterrent to murder and does not lower the murder rate. And most who responded that way say they feel strongly about their view.

Moreover, nearly one-third of Marylanders — including nearly half of African Americans — say capital punishment has been applied unfairly in the state. That’s another argument O’Malley has advanced in a state where five men sit on death row but no executions have taken place since 2005.

Yet even when those arguments are stated explicitly — as well as questions that critics have raised about the morality of capital punishment — support for repeal is tepid among the public.

The Post also reports, "In Maryland, five wait on death row," by Theresa Vargas.

Vernon Lee Evans Jr. should have been dead by now. A prosecutor did his best to ensure that when he convinced a Maryland jury that Evans was among the worst of the worst, a killer who deserved a punishment more severe than a life spent in prison. He deserved, the prosecutor argued and the jury agreed, to die at the hands of the state.

That was nearly 30 years ago.

In the years since, the motel where Evans gunned down two employees has been replaced by a Howard Johnson. The star witness in the case, a woman who lost her husband and a sister that day, has died. And Evans, who in his own words has “rebuilt” his character, remains on Maryland’s death row, kept alive in a politically forged purgatory.

“In hindsight, it would have been better if he got life without parole,” David B. Irwin, the former prosecutor who handled the case, said recently. “But it wasn’t obvious to us as young prosecutors back then that this was the way it was going to turn out.”

As the state Senate prepares to vote this week on whether Maryland should abolish capital punishment, the Evans case illustrates what can happen when the death penalty exists but is not enforced.

Unlike Virginia, which has executed more than 100 people since 1976, including one man last month, Maryland has executed five people since it reinstituted the death penalty in 1978, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. No one has been executed in Maryland since 2005.

What is essentially a moratorium on capital punishment has been in place in Maryland since 2006, and since 2009, the state has required DNA evidence, a videotaped crime or a videotaped confession in capital cases.

Earlier coverage from Maryland begins at the link.

Oregon Repeal Legislation Heard

"Death penalty opponents want Oregon vote on repealing capital punishment," is the AP report filed by Jonathan J. Cooper.  It's via the Republic.

Death penalty opponents took their case to Oregon lawmakers Monday, imploring a state House committee to allow the public to vote on outlawing capital punishment.

The House Judiciary Committee took no action on the measure, which would ask voters in 2014 whether to amend the state constitution, making it illegal to execute anyone, including people already on death row.

"My plea today, as a citizen of Oregon, is do not kill in my name," said Aba Gayle of Silverton, whose 19-year-old daughter, Catherine Blount, was murdered in 1980. "And most importantly of all, do not tarnish the name of my beautiful daughter with another senseless killing."

Her daughter's killer, Douglas Mickey, is on death row in California.

Terri Hakim disagrees. She doesn't want to see any benefits for the father and son convicted of planting a bomb that killed her husband, Oregon State Police Senior Trooper Bill Hakim, at a Woodburn Bank in 2008.

The Salem Statesman Journal reports, "Death penalty subject of bill," by Peter Wong.

House Joint Resolution 1 is a proposed constitutional amendment to abolish the death penalty, which Oregon voters reinstated in 1984. If lawmakers refer it and voters approve it in November 2014, the penalty for aggravated murder — the only crime punishable by death — would revert to life imprisonment.

Terri Hakim was the only witness to oppose the measure.

“If these men were allowed back into the general (prison) population, they are ‘heroes’ and will continue to teach their words of prejudice and disregard for human life,” she said, referring to trial testimony about the Turnidges’ anti-government views.

The current debate was prompted by Gov. John Kitzhaber, who on Nov. 22, 2011, issued a reprieve blocking the scheduled execution of Gary Haugen and vowed there would be no executions during his tenure. Haugen is challenging his reprieve in court.

Kitzhaber was en route Monday from a conference in Washington, D.C.

But in a letter to the committee, he said: “Courts are applying stricter standards and continually raising the bar for prosecuting death penalty cases. For a state intent on maintaining a death penalty, the inevitable result will be bigger questions, fewer options and higher costs. It is time for Oregon to consider a different approach.”

Wong also wrote an earlier version, "Gov. Kitzhaber backs measure to end death penalty," which is still available from the Statesman Journal.

Kitzhaber started the current debate back on Nov. 22, 2011, when he granted a temporary reprieve to twice-convicted murderer Gary Haugen, two weeks before Haugen’s scheduled execution at the Oregon State Penitentiary.

Haugen is challenging his reprieve. The Oregon Supreme Court hears the case on March 14.

Like Douglas Franklin Wright and Harry Charles Moore, Haugen waived further rights of appeal. Kitzhaber did not intervene in the two earlier cases, and the executions by lethal injection proceeded in 1996 and 1997, during his first term as governor.

“I have regretted those choices ever since – both because of my own deep personal convictions about capital punishment and also because, in practice, Oregon has an expensive and unworkable system that fails to meet basic standards of justice,” Kitzhaber wrote in his statement.

Kitzhaber’s reprieve applied only to Haugen – he did not commute any of the sentences of the 36 men and one woman on death row – but he also vowed no executions during his current tenure as governor.

The Oregonian reports, "Oregon death penalty 'indefensible,' says man who last carried it out."  It's written by Helen Jung.

The man who oversaw Oregon's last two executions at the Oregon State Penitentiary said the death penalty fails to deter crime, does not make the public any safer and forces prison officials into an untenable position.

"Asking decent men and women to participate in the name of a failed public policy that takes human life is indefensible and rises to a level of immorality," said Frank Thompson, who was superintendent of the penitentiary from 1994 to 1998.

Thompson was one of more than a dozen people to testify in front of the House Judiciary Committee Tuesday. All but one, the widow of an Oregon State Police trooper who was killed in the 2008 Woodburn bank bombing, urged the committee to move forward a resolution asking voters to repeal the death penalty and replace it with a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

But the bill, sponsored by Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland, faces long odds.

"I don't know if it will progress past this point," said Rep. Jeff Barker, D-Aloha, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee. He conceded that he is "not a big supporter of changing" the law, which allows for capital punishment in aggravated murder cases.

Bills to alter the death penalty have not made it out of committee in recent years.

"Oregon Lawmakers Consider Death Penalty Repeal," is by Chris Lehman for Northwest News Network.  It's via Oregon Public Broadcasting.  There is audio at the link.

More than a year ago, Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber stunned people by enacting a moratorium on the death penalty. It happened just weeks before the scheduled execution of two-time murderer Gary Haugen. At a hearing Tuesday, lawmakers took up the question of whether to ask voters to repeal the death penalty altogether. But it’s not clear whether that will actually happen.

Dan Bryant knows the unique pain of learning a loved one has been murdered. His mother was stabbed to death by a mentally-ill relative in 1998.

"Five years later, her killer died while under the care of the State Hospital," Bryant says. "His death did nothing to bring closure, relief or any sense of justice to me or my family."

Now, the Eugene minister is asking lawmakers to send a repeal of the death penalty to Oregon voters. Ending capital punishment in Oregon would have to be done at the ballot. That's because Oregon voters put it in the state Constitution nearly 30 years ago.

Earlier coverage from Colorado begins at the link.

UN Chief Reaffirms Call for Moratorium on Death Penalty

That's the title of a news release issued by the UN News Service.  Here's the full text:

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today reiterated his call for a global moratorium on applying the death penalty, stressing the United Nations’ long history of opposing the practice and the growing momentum among the international community to permanently end it.

“A global moratorium is a crucial stepping stone towards full worldwide abolition,” Mr. Ban said in a message delivered by the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Kyung-wha Kang.

“Capital punishment is inconsistent with the mission of the United Nations to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights and the dignity and worth of the human person,” Ms. Kang read, during an event at the Human Rights Council in Geneva organized by the International Commission against the Death Penalty, an independent body opposed to capital punishment.

The UN General Assembly first voted on a moratorium in 2007, and again in December 2012 with the support of 111 countries, 41 against and 34 abstentions. The resolution called for a progressive restriction on the use of capital punishment and eliminating it entirely for felons below the age of 18 and pregnant women.

Although not legally binding, the UN moratorium on executions carries moral and political weight.

“The United Nations system has long advocated the abolition of the death penalty. International and hybrid tribunals supported by the UN do not provide for capital punishment, nor does the International Criminal Court,” Mr. Ban’s message noted.

Approximately150 countries have either abolished the death penalty or do not practice it, but Mr. Ban noted that some recently reinstated the practice.

Thousands of people are executed each year, “often in violation of international standards, such as the right to fair trial and due process,” Mr. Ban said.

He added that the death penalty is still used for a wide range of crimes that do not meet the threshold of “most serious crimes” and based on information that is not transparent.

In addition, sometimes “wrongful convictions and miscarriages of justice” can occur in well-functioning legal systems that sentence and execute persons who have been ultimately proven innocent, Mr. Ban said.

Earlier coverage from the United Nations begins at the link.  Related posts are in the international category index.

Oregon Repeal Bill To Be Heard by House Judiciary Committee

"Death penalty ban gets a hearing: Oregon Legislature Today," is the report by Harry Esteve in today's Oregonian.

Oregon's death penalty takes center stage Tuesday at the Legislature, which will hold a public hearing on whether to eliminate it.

House Joint Resolution 1, sponsored by Rep. Mitch Greenlick, would put the question to voters on the November 2014 ballot. The issue arose when Gov. John Kitzhaber declared a moratorium on executions to prevent convicted killer Gary Haugen from being put to death in Oregon.

Greenlick's bill asks voters to substitute the sentence, "A sentence of death may not be imposed or executed," for language in the state constitution that allows for capital punishment.

Greenlick plans to hold a news conference about the proposal at noon. The hearing, which will be livestreamed, is at 1 p.m. in House Judiciary.

The AP reports, "Oregon lawmakers to consider death penalty repeal."  It's by Jonathan J. Cooper, via KOMO-TV and the Columbian.

Oregon's complicated relationship with capital punishment takes center stage this week as a House committee takes up Gov. John Kitzhaber's plea for a public vote on repealing the death penalty.

On Tuesday, the House Judiciary Committee will hear public testimony on a measure that would ask voters in 2014 whether to insert 10 words in the state constitution: "A sentence of death shall not be imposed or executed."

The proposal doesn't seem likely to go very far, especially after voters in California rejected a similar measure last year.

House Speaker Tina Kotek said she wants to see more evidence the measure could pass in Oregon, although she stopped short of ruling out a 2014 vote.

"I think it was unfortunate that California wasn't successful, and I think that impacted our ability to be successful in the near term," Kotek said.

Rep. Mitch Greenlick, the Portland Democrat sponsoring the measure, said he believes it would pass, and he'd like to see the measure go forward. Kitzhaber told reporters last month that he'd like to see a vote in 2014 even if polling showed the measure was unlikely to pass.

One Republican, Rep. Bob Jenson of Pendleton, has signed on. He said death penalty cases are expensive to try and to appeal, and forensic evidence has proven the innocence of some death row inmates around the country.

"Once you throw the switch, it's impossible to reverse those mistakes," said Jenson said.

Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link.  The state currently has a moratorium on executions by order of the governor.

Legal Challenge Expected for New Arkansas Lethal Injection Law

"Legal challenges likely to delay Ark. executions," is the AP report filed by Jeannie Nuss.  It's via CT Post.

Arkansas enacted a new lethal injection law this week, ending months in legal limbo after the state's top court threw out the old law last year.

However, with more legal challenges expected, the state is likely months away from killing a condemned prisoner for the first time since 2005.

The attorney general's office expects some of the state's 37 death row inmates to challenge the new law.

"We don't know when the inmates will choose to file their lawsuit, but we are prepared for them to file it and we will be ready when they do," Chief Deputy Attorney General Brad Phelps said.

Two days after Gov. Mike Beebe signed the new execution legislation into law, no new execution dates had been set on Friday, meaning the state doesn't have any pending executions. For that to change, Attorney General Dustin McDaniel would have to notify Beebe that inmates' court challenges have run their course and ask him to schedule executions.

Phelps, the chief deputy attorney general, would not say which of the eight inmates who have exhausted their appeals would be the first to have an execution date.

And:

The Arkansas Supreme Court in June deemed a 2009 lethal injection law unconstitutional, saying the Legislature had given the Department of Correction "unfettered discretion" to figure out the protocol and procedures for executions, including the chemicals to be used.

What Beebe signed Wednesday spells out in greater detail the procedures that must be followed. However, some lawmakers expressed concerns that the law fails to address issues that led the court to overturn the previous one.

The new law says the state must use a lethal dose of a barbiturate, but leaves it up to the Department of Correction to determine which drug. So far, that agency hasn't rushed into selecting a drug.

"It's not like we're chomping at the bit for another execution. They're difficult," Department of Correction spokeswoman Dina Tyler said. "But if it's going to be the law of the land we have to have a way to carry it out."

Earlier coverage of the new Arkansas lethal injection law begins at the link.  Related posts are in the lethal injection index.  Arkansas has had a de facto moratorium on executions because the defective law.

Montana Repeal Bill to Be Introduced

The Great Falls Tribune reports, "Anti-death penalty bill revived: Group to call for life in prison without parole instead."  It's written by John S. Adams.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers in the House and Senate plan to introduce a bill to abolish the death penalty in Montana.

The proposed measure would replace the death penalty with life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The bill, which has not yet been introduced, is co-sponsored by Rep. Doug Kary, R-Billings; Rep. Margie MacDonald, D-Billings; Sen. Matthew Rosendale, R-Glendive; and Sen. Dave Wanzenried, D-Missoula.

Similar efforts to abolish the death penalty have failed in past legislative sessions. The bill cleared the Senate in 2009 and 2011 before dying in the House Judiciary Committee.

A new bipartisan coalition of conservative lawmakers, human rights groups and religious organizations hopes this renewed effort will have the momentum it needs to guide the bill through the legislative process and on to the governor’s desk.

At a Friday lunch meeting of a group called Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty, Rosendale urged fellow conservatives to “come out of the shadows” and support the pending legislation.

“There are a lot of people who support the abolition of the death penalty who won’t come out of their closets and stand there and let other folks know (they oppose the death penalty) because they’re nervous,” Rosendale said. “They’re not sure how many people would stand with them and oppose it.”

Earlier coverage of the conservative assault on capital punishment in Montana begins at the link.  Coverage of repeal legislation in the 2011 and 2009 Montana legislative sessions is also available.

Montana currently has a de facto moratorium on executions because the state's lethal injection procedure was ruled uncostitutional last year.  The case of Ronald Smith, a Canadian citizen on the state's death row has also received significant attention.

Lethal Injection Update From Kentucky - Updated

"Change in execution method set to go into effect," is the AP report written by Brett Barrouquere.  It's via the Lexington Herald-Leader.

At least three Death Row inmates could be nearing execution as Kentucky moves toward a new lethal injection method.

Execution requests for two of the condemned men were made to the governor's office in 2010, but a judge barred the state from carrying out any executions until it switched to something other than a three-drug lethal injection method.

The state has revamped its method and now must go before Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd to ask for the suspension to be lifted. Until then, the governor can't take any action toward carrying out a death sentence.

Requests have already been made to execute Robert Karl Foley, 56, convicted of six murders in Madison and Laurel counties, and Ralph S. Baze, 57, condemned for shooting and killing a sheriff and deputy in 1992.

Also, 51-year-old Benny Lee Hodge's appeals based on the trial record have run out in the August 1985 slaying of Tammy Acker, whose father was robbed of $1.9 million in Fleming-Neon in Eastern Kentucky.

Kentucky is implementing lethal injection by one or two drugs, depending upon their availability. The change, which takes effect Friday, brings Kentucky in line with at least seven states using the single-drug execution protocol.

Should Shepherd allow executions to go forward, the state can then begin reviewing cases and purchasing the necessary drugs. A public records request in January by The Associated Press showed that Kentucky had not yet purchased the drugs needed.

And:

The revised regulations specify that doses of the drug used in the one-drug execution — 3 grams of sodium thiopental or 5 grams of pentobarbital — be repeated if the inmate has not died within 10 minutes.

In a two-drug execution, the warden may authorize continued injections of 60 milligrams of hydromorphone until the inmate dies. Kentucky previously used sodium thiopental, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride.

Shepherd's ruling halting all lethal injections came as the state prepared to execute Gregory L. Wilson, 56, for the 1987 rape, kidnapping and murder of 36-year-old Debbie Pooley in Kenton County. Wilson has since won a hearing in state court on whether he is mentally disabled and ineligible for execution.

Public defender David Barron, who represents several Death Row inmates, said he plans to challenge the new method.

Kentucky has executed three men at the Kentucky State Penitentiary in Eddyville since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976, the last one in November 2008.

The Huntington Herald-Dispatch reports, "Ky. officials: State ready to resume executions."

Kentucky is ready to resume executions because a new one- or two-drug lethal injection method that took effect Friday addresses concerns by inmates that the previously used three-drug mixture amounted to cruel and unusual punishment, prosecutors said.

In a notice filed in Franklin Circuit Court, the Kentucky Attorney General’s office told Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd that the method should cancel out any arguments made by the condemned inmates.

Prosecutors want a final ruling from Shepherd that would lift his order that stopped executions in Kentucky.

The revised regulations that went into effect Friday specify that doses of the drug used in the one-drug execution — 3 grams of sodium thiopental or 5 grams of pentobarbital — be repeated if the inmate has not died within 10 minutes.

Earlier coverage of Kentucky lethal injection issues begins at the link.  Additional coverage from Kentucky is available at the links.  There is currently a de facto moratorium on executions in the state because of the lack of a lethal injection protocol.

Also, from Kentucky, the Louisville Courier-Journal reports, "Two-thirds of Kentuckians want to keep death penalty," by Jessie Halladay.

About two-thirds of Kentuckians support the death penalty as an option for murderers and do not want it replaced with a sentence of life in prison without parole, according to the latest Courier-Journal Bluegrass Poll.

Two bills have been proposed in this year’s General Assembly — one in the Senate and one in the House — to abolish the death penalty.

About 67 percent of the 609 registered voters surveyed said they support capital punishment in Kentucky, while 26 percent said they’d like to see it abolished. Another 7 percent of those polled said they were not sure about the issue.

George Ryan Released From FCI

Today's Chicago Tribune reports, "Ryan returns home to finish sentence under house arrest."  It's by Jason Meisner, Annie Sweeney, and Angie Leventis Lourgos.

Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan was let out of a federal prison in Indiana in the dead of night early Wednesday and checked briefly into a Chicago halfway house before he was released — in a surprise decision — to his home to finish out his 61/2-year sentence on home confinement.

The quick turn of events allowed Ryan, who turns 79 next month, to elude a horde of media gathered at the prison in Terre Haute, Ind., and then slip from the halfway house on the Near West Side undetected several hours later.

By 10:30 a.m., Ryan had an emotional reunion with 17 of his children and grandchildren at his longtime Kankakee home, according to his attorney, former Gov. Jim Thompson. Later in the day, Ryan's daughter, Jeanette, smiled as she left through a rear entrance. "We are very happy he's home," she said.

Home confinement for Ryan means he won't have to face weeks or months at the Salvation Army halfway house where many of the state's other disgraced politicians have had to take up residence.

And:

Ryan is home for the first time since wife Lura Lynn died, and his oldest grandson will be staying with him, Thompson said.

"I imagine it's very hard," Thompson said. "Just as I imagine it's been very hard ever since she died and it's been very hard ever since he left her (for prison). At least he's got closure now with his family."

"Ex-Ill. Gov. Ryan released from halfway house," is the AP filing by Michael Tarm, via the Frankfort State-Journal.

Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan was back at his longtime home on Wednesday following his pre-dawn release from a federal prison after serving more than five years for corruption.

He first reported to a halfway house in Chicago but in a development that took observers by surprise was allowed to go to his spacious home in Kankakee, where he'll be under home confinement for at least several weeks, his attorney Jim Thompson said.

Speaking from Ryan's living room, Thompson said Ryan was beaming and surrounded by his smiling grandchildren

"If you could see his and his grandkids' smiling faces," Thompson, himself a former governor, said by phone from Ryan's home. "He is surrounded by happy faces."

Thompson said officials decided Ryan didn't require the services halfway houses provide, which include ensuring ex-cons can use a checkbook.

Ryan will still be subject to strict rules, including prohibitions against speaking to the media or leaving the house. Thompson added that Ryan was granted retirement status by authorities, so he won't be required to find a job.

Ryan was sentenced to 6 ½ years on Nov. 7, 2007, and his term officially ends July 4 after compiling 305 days credit for good conduct, said Bureau of Prisons spokesman Chris Burke.

Looking relaxed and thinner than before prison, Ryan walked past throngs of reporters into a Chicago halfway house earlier in the morning.

Ryan, 78, left the federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind., at around 1 a.m. on Wednesday -- five months before his prison term officially ended, having qualified for early release to the Salvation Army-run Freedom Center.

The Chicago Sun-Times publishes the editorial, "Ryan's redemption."

Former Gov. George Ryan probably isn’t making any big plans just yet.

Hugging his grandchildren, sitting with his children and enjoying the quiet of his own home after more than five years in prison are, we’re quite sure, more than enough for now.

But when it’s time, Ryan likely will get re-involved with death penalty issues, his lawyer, former Gov. Jim Thompson, said Wednesday after Ryan’s release to home confinement.

That sounds just right to us.

For all of Ryan’s misdeeds, Illinois’ former governor did right when it came to the death penalty.

And he did right, we think, for the right reasons.

"George Ryan's restitution," is the Chicago Tribune editorial.

In 2006, federal jurors convicted George Ryan on 18 felony corruption counts: racketeering, mail fraud, tax fraud, filing false tax returns, lying to FBI agents. Nine people, six of them children named Willis, lie dead because of the crime spree on Ryan's watch: When he was secretary of state, as many as 2,000 truckers bribed his employees to get driver's licenses. Some of that blood money flowed to his political fund — and some of those truckers caused crashes that killed those nine and injured dozens more. As U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald had said when the ex-governor was indicted: "Ryan is charged with betraying the citizens of Illinois for over a decade on state business, both large and small. ... Defendant Ryan sold his office."

And:

George Ryan, ex-con, is free to vanish. But he's also free to make at least partial restitution to his victims. There is much he can say to the people of Illinois. Much he can teach to politicians of today, and tomorrow. Much he can do to renounce — to help reform — the Illinois culture of political sleaze.

If Ryan in the past didn't want to speak remorse for his crimes lest he undermine appeals of his verdict or sentence, that excuse is moot. If pride kept him from admitting guilt, he's now liberated to speak from the heart. If the native Iowan is embarrassed that four of his adopted state's last nine governors went to prison, he can demand better of the political class in whose grievous sins he wallowed.

"Welcome Home, Governor Ryan," is David Protess' essay at Huffington Post.  He's President of the Chicago Innocence Project.  Here's the beginning:

On a frigid February evening in 1999, I called home to check my messages. "Gov. Ryan just called you," my teenage son Ben claimed. I laughed at the seemingly obvious prank. "No, Dad, it really was the governor. I recognized his voice. He wants you to call him at home."

What could this be about, I wondered? Perhaps the Anthony Porter case? Porter was a condemned inmate who had come within 50 hours of execution, only to be freed earlier that week when my journalism students and a private investigator uncovered proof of his innocence.

As it turned out, the Illinois Republican governor and his wife, Lura Lynn, had watched Porter's dramatic release on WGN-TV. The governor was stunned. "How does an innocent man sit on death row for 15 years...?" he asked his wife in disbelief.

When I returned Ryan's call, he had a more practical question: "What can I do to help that poor guy?"

I explained that a gubernatorial pardon would guarantee Porter restitution for his 17 years of wrongful incarceration. The governor promised to promptly take care of it.

The business part of our conversation concluded, the governor stayed on the line, musing about the case. He was horrified that Porter had almost been executed on his watch. "I would have been responsible for the death of an innocent man," Ryan whispered.

Earlier news of former Governor Ryan begins at the links.

Commentary From Arkansas

Today's Baxter Bulletin publishes Steve Barnes' column, "Will Beebe remarks spark capitol punishment action?"

Gov. Beebe’s declaration, a few days ago, that he would sign a bill abolishing the death penalty in Arkansas in the (highly improbable) event such legislation reached his desk caused a bit of confusion. At a meeting of the Political Animals club last week, Mr. Beebe said he had been confronted four times with the “awesome” question of life or death for a condemned killer.

It turns out Mr. Beebe’s miscounted. According to his staff, not four inmates, but eight. And not four, or eight, death warrants to consider, but an even dozen; the legal machinery had restarted the process in the cases of four prisoners whose sentences initially had been stayed by a judge, then returned to the governor before additional appeals again made the question of final executive action moot. The back-and-forth of those four inmates, one of his aides suggested, had led the chief executive to unintentionally understate, in pure numbers, a burden of office.

And:

With the governor’s disavowal of any intent to pursue abolition of the death penalty, and legislative interest in the subject of capital punishment all but restricted to preserving it, that would be the end of the discussion — except it won’t be. Simply by making public his distaste for state-sponsored killing, Mr. Beebe put a little new fire in the bellies of those who abhor it.

“Magnificent,” was the judgment of a long-time opponent of the death penalty who was present for the governor’s comment but who declined to be identified by name. “I knew he felt that way in his heart but never thought I’d hear him say it.”

Bob Sells, a retired Little Rock advertising executive and a prominent opponent of capital punishment, wondered if Mr. Beebe’s “evolved” disdain of the death sentence might prompt one or more hardy legislators to undertake repeal.

“Now that (the governor) has made a statement,” Sells told me, “I wonder if there’s anybody in the House or Senate with the guts to take it on.”

Earlier coverage from Arkansas begins at the link; you can also go directly to Gov. Beebe's remarks.

More Arkansas Lethal Injection Legislation Expected

Today's Stuttgart Daily News posts the AP report, "More execution legislation to be filed in Arkansas."  It's filed by Jeannie Nuss.

More execution legislation is expected to crop up in the coming weeks as policymakers and lawmakers try to come up with a new lethal injection law after the Arkansas Supreme Court struck down the one on the books last year.

Staffers with Attorney General Dustin McDaniel's office are working with the Department of Correction on new execution legislation that could be filed later this month or in early February.

Gov. Mike Beebe would sign such a proposal if it reaches his desk, spokesman Matt DeCample said, even though the Democratic governor said last week that he would also sign a bill outlawing capital punishment.

"We have a law on the books now and no legal mechanism to carry it out," DeCample said. "And that's the expected fix that we will see from the Department of Correction working with the Legislature."

The Arkansas Supreme Court last year did not deem lethal injection or the death penalty unconstitutional. Instead, the high court threw out a 2009 lethal injection law, siding with a group of death row inmates who said it violated part of the state's constitution that deals with separating the branches of government.

And:

A proposal being drafted by the attorney general's office is expected to call for using one drug in lethal injections instead of a three-drug cocktail.

"By narrowing that drug protocol, we're hoping that would take care of the court's concern that the direction had too much discretion," correction department spokeswoman Shea Wilson said.

Several other states have moved away from the three-drug cocktail, in part because there's of a shortage of drugs used in it.

It's not clear which Arkansas lawmaker will file the bill being drafted by the state attorney general's office, but it won't be the first proposal about executions to come up this legislative session.

Sen. Bart Hester, R-Cave Springs, has already taken a crack at solving the execution law, though Wilson said his proposal didn't address the drug shortage.

Earlier coverage from Arkansas begins at the link.  Related posts are in the lethal injection index.

Because of the Arkansas Supreme Court ruling, the state currently has a de facto moratorium on executions.

The Path in California

Howard Mintz writes, "California death penalty: Will state follow Arizona, which has resumed executions after a long hiatus?" for the Silicon Valley Mercury News.  It's via the Contra Costa Times.  Here's the beginning:

When Arizona prison officials injected condemned rapist and murderer Richard Stokley with a single, fatal drug dose last month, it marked the state's sixth execution of the year in the nation's second busiest death chamber.

Now that California voters in November narrowly preserved the death penalty, Arizona's path could foreshadow the future for this state, where not a single one of the 729 death row inmates have marched to execution in seven years.

As in California, interminable legal tangles once shut down Arizona's death penalty system as the state executed only one inmate, who volunteered to die, from 2001 to 2010. But Arizona emerged from numerous court battles that removed all of the legal roadblocks that remain in California.

The result has been 11 executions since October 2010, nearly the number California has carried out since it restored the death penalty in 1978. Significantly, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, often the last word for death penalty appeals in the Western states, has not intervened.

Now, legal challenges holding up California's executions are expected to resume this year.

"I do think eventually the cases all come to an end," said Dale Baich, who heads a unit representing Arizona death row inmates. "But (in California) it might be later than sooner."

In fact, the timetable may still be measured in years, not months. Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye in December told reporters it could take three years for executions to resume, particularly because of the lingering legal cloud over the state's lethal injection procedures.At least 14 inmates have exhausted all of their legal appeals and would be eligible for immediate execution if California resolves the broader legal challenges over the death penalty.

Earlier coverage from California begins at the link.  Because of court orders involving lethal injection issues, the state currently has a de facto moratorium on executions.

Lethal Injection Roundup - Arkansas Bill Filed; Louisiana Challenge

"Bills filed on lethal injection, abortion, guns in church," is the title of John Lyon's report for the Arkansas News Bureau.

Measures to change the state’s lethal injection law, limit abortions and allow people to carry guns in church were among the bills filed on Thursday, the fourth day of the legislative session.

Senate Bill 73 by Sen. Bart Hester, R-Cave Springs, would set forth specific procedures and chemicals for the state Department of Correction to use in carrying out executions. The state Supreme Court struck down the state’s lethal injection law last year, saying the Legislature “abdicated its responsibility” by giving the Department of Correction too much enforcement discretion in violation of the separation of powers doctrine.

Executions have been on hold in the state because of the ruling.

The Methods of Execution Act, which the Legislature approved in 2009, states that a death sentence is to be carried out by lethal injection using one or more chemicals “as determined in kind and amount in the discretion of the director of the Department of Correction.”

The law says the chemicals could be one or more ultra short-acting barbiturates; one or more chemical paralytic agents; potassium chloride; and “any other chemical or chemicals, including but not limited to, saline solution.” An attorney for prisoners who challenged the law argued last year that the law theoretically would allow any substance, even rat poison, to be used to execute prisoners.

SB73 would require the Department of Correction to use one or more of the following: sodium pentothal or sodium thiopental; pancuronium bromide; potassium chloride; or saline solution. It would remove the phrase “any other chemical or chemicals, including but not limited to,” which the high court said gave the Department of Correction too much discretion.

The bill also sets forth a step-by-step procedure for carrying out executions.

“All we’re hoping to do is clarify the law to make the Supreme Court comfortable with it so we can proceed with executions again in the state,” Hester said Thursday.

Today's Baton Rouge Advocate reports, "Killer’s attorney sues state as execution date nears."  It's by Joe Gyan Jr.  The article provides background on earlier lethal injection litigation in the state.  Here's the beginning:

Attorneys for a DeSoto Parish man scheduled to be executed Feb. 13 for fatally scalding his 6-year-old stepson in 1992 are asking a Baton Rouge court to order state corrections officials to turn over records relating to Louisiana’s lethal injection procedures and protocols.

The New Orleans-based Capital Post Conviction Project of Louisiana, which represents Christopher Sepulvado, also is seeking a preliminary injunction until the requested records are produced and all litigation challenging lethal injection has been resolved or terminated.

“It would probably have that effect,” CPCPL director Gary Clements said Thursday when asked in a telephone interview if the request for an injunction is essentially a request for a stay of execution.

In a lawsuit Clements filed Tuesday at the 19th Judicial District Court, he says the Louisiana Supreme Court is currently considering lethal injection litigation that involves Sepulvado and all other Louisiana death-row inmates.

“The State brought Mr. Sepulvado into ongoing lethal injection litigation, but it now seeks to execute him by the very method that is at issue in pending litigation of which he is a party,” CPCPL attorney Kathleen Kelly argues in the suit.

Clements contends in his suit that the Department of Public Safety and Corrections arbitrarily denied him access to a large majority of the records he requested Dec. 18, including records reflecting the country and company of origin for each of the lethal injection drugs currently in the department’s possession.

Earlier coverage of Arkansas and Louisiana lethal injection issues begins at the links.  Related posts are in the lethal injection index.

Arkansas Governor Would Sign Repeal Law

"Beebe: Would sign death-penalty ban," is the title of John Lyon's Arkansas News Bureau report.

Gov. Mike Beebe said Wednesday his thinking on capital punishment has evolved to the point that he would sign legislation to repeal the death penalty if the Legislature sent him a bill.

Beebe also said he would prefer to see more resource officers in Arkansas schools than an influx of armed volunteers.

The governor’s comments came during an appearance at a meeting of the Political Animals Club at the Governor’s Mansion.

Beebe, in the middle of his second and final term as governor after 20 years in the state Senate and four years as state attorney general, said his evolution on the death penalty was not philosophical.

“What caused me to come to that way of thinking is how I felt when I had to sign a death warrant,” he said.

Beebe has signed four death warrants since he became governor in 2007, although no one has been put to death on his watch because of pending litigation.

The AP filing is, "Beebe says he'd sign bill outlawing death penalty," via KTHV-TV.

Gov. Mike Beebe says he would sign legislation outlawing Arkansas' death penalty - but a spokesman says the governor won't make it a part of his legislative package for this year's session.

The Democratic governor says his feelings on the death penalty have evolved since he took office in 2007. Beebe has signed four death warrants - but none was carried out because of various court challenges.

And:

Afterward, Beebe spokesman Matt DeCample said Beebe didn't plan to ask anyone to introduce such legislation.

Arkansas last executed an inmate in 2005. Last year, the Arkansas Supreme Court struck down the state's execution law and lawmakers are expected to rewrite it this session.

Earlier coverage from Arkansas begins at the link.

More From Maryland

Today's Baltimore Sun publishes the editorial, "End Md.'s death penalty."

What is somewhat incongruous about the timing of this push is that it comes a few days after the release of new poll data showing that Marylanders, by a solid margin, do not favor a repeal. An OpinionWorks survey conducted late last month and early this month found 48 percent opposed to a repeal and 42 percent in favor. Given the recent success of conservative activists in petitioning acts of the General Assembly to the ballot, it's fair to ask whether the governor and other repeal proponents are setting themselves up for failure.

We don't think so. There is strong reason to believe that when Marylanders think more deeply about the issue — and the alternatives to capital punishment — that a majority will support the end of a policy that costs too much, achieves little, and diminishes us as a society.

Support for the death penalty in Maryland is markedly lower than it is elsewhere — the most recent Gallup poll on the issue found support at 63 percent nationally, a significant drop from a high of 80 percent recorded in 1994. But both Gallup and OpinionWorks asked the question as a straight yes-or-no proposition, rather than presenting respondents with options. When life without parole is offered as an alternative in polls, the response nationally and in Maryland is quite different. A 2010 Washington Post poll found Maryland voters in favor of the death penalty by a 60-32 margin. But when the paper asked respondents whether they preferred life without parole or the death penalty as a punishment for murderers, life in prison won, 49-40.

That corresponds with the way Maryland juries have viewed the issue in recent years. In 2011, a Harford Countyjury decided against the death penalty for a Rosedale man convicted in a contract killing. The next year, an Anne Arundel County jury opted against the death penalty for a man already serving life in prison who was convicted of killing a prison guard. In fact, a Maryland jury has not sentenced anyone to death since 1998. Maryland has executed five people since reinstating capital punishment in 1976 and has five people on death row now, three of whom were sentenced in 1983. If jurors, who are forced to confront the gruesome facts of the most heinous murders, choose life without parole instead of capital punishment, so too will Maryland voters, if they are given a chance.

The Sun also carries news coverage of the governor's speech, "O'Malley predicts voters would back death penalty repeal."  It's written by Michael Dresser.

Expressing confidence that "the will is there" in the General Assembly to do away with capital punishment, Gov.Martin O'Malley predicted Tuesday that Maryland voters would uphold a decision to repeal the death penalty.

As expected, O'Malley announced at an Annapolis news conference that his administration would sponsor legislation to abolish death sentences in the state.

Appearing with the national president of the NAACP and dozens of legislative co-sponsors, O'Malley predicted that this will be the year the General Assembly puts an end to capital punishment.

The Washington Post reports, "O’Malley calls for end of executions, confirming plans for repeal bill," by John Wagner.

O’Malley spoke at a packed indoor rally alongside civil rights leaders and other long-time repeal advocates, who expressed confidence that the votes will materialize to make Maryland the 18th state to end capital punishment.

“This is the year that we will end the death penalty in Maryland,” said Benjamin T. Jealous, chief executive officer of the NAACP, who argued that capital punishment was “broken from birth.”

Chances for passage have increased significantly this year with a pledge from Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert) to allow debate on the floor of the chamber if there are insufficient votes in a key committee to advance the bill.

"Death-Penalty Ban Pushed in Maryland," by Ashby Jones in the Wall Street Journal.

Mr. O'Malley, a Democrat seen as a possible presidential hopeful in 2016, said he would introduce a bill to the state legislature this week calling for the full repeal of the state's death penalty. If it passed, Maryland would become the sixth state to abolish capital punishment since 2007—joining Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, New Mexico and New York. Thirty-three states retain the power to sentence inmates to death.

In his remarks, Mr. O'Malley repeatedly referred to a 2008 study by a Maryland commission that found the cost of pursuing a capital case is three times the cost of pursuing a murder conviction with a sentence of life without parole. In recent years, death-penalty critics have questioned whether the occasional execution is worth the taxpayer money spent on lengthy appeals and costly lawyers for inmates, especially at a time when state budgets are strained.

The vote in Maryland's Senate is expected to be close, according to people familiar with the situation. Twenty-four of the Senate's 47 members need to vote for the bill in order for it to move to the state House of Delegates, where it is widely expected to pass.

"O'Malley joins NAACP in call to end death penalty," by Earl Kelly in the Annapolis Capital Gazette.

O’Malley wants to replace the death penalty with life without parole. He said modern prisons and improved protocols — not the death penalty — make prison guards safer, even without the threat of execution for someone serving a life sentence.

He pointed to the closing of the dilapidated prison in Jessup as an an improvement that protects guards.

“We have done a lot of things to better safeguard the lives of our officers,” he said. “I don’t believe the death penalty is a deterrence, even there (in prisons).”

O’Malley, making his case during a press conference in the Miller Senate Office Building in Annapolis, noted the United States ranks fifth in the world in the use of capital punishment, behind Iran, North Korea, China and Yemen.

NAACP president Benjamin Jealous said the death penalty tarnishes the image of the United States as a beacon to the rest of the world.

Earlier coverage from Maryland begins with Gov. O'Malley's full statement.

Maryland State Senate Preseident Expects Repeal to Pass

Today's Washington Post publishes the editorial, "Another chance to end the death penalty."  It begins our roundup of Maryland coverage the day after the state's General Assembly convened.

BY THE GRACE of state Sen. Thomas V. Mike Miller (D-Calvert), Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) has been handed a second chance — probably his last — to abolish the state’s death penalty. He should seize it.

Four years ago, in deference to Mr. O’Malley, who opposes capital punishment, Mr. Miller, the powerful president of the Senate and a supporter of the death penalty, allowed the issue to reach the Senate floor. There, despite cajoling, the governor could not corral the 24 votes needed for abolition. Instead, a bill was enacted that limited Maryland’s death penalty to cases where there is DNA evidence, a videotaped confession or a video linking the suspect to a murder.

Now Mr. Miller has given Mr. O’Malley a green light to try again — if he can find the necessary 24 votes in the Senate.

The good news is that the votes may be within reach. (They’re already there in the House of Delegates, according to nose-counters in Annapolis.) The puzzling news is that Mr. O’Malley, though he remains as opposed to capital punishment as ever, is balking.

Perhaps the governor is simply being cautious. According to The Post’s John Wagner, 23 senators are firmly, or relatively firmly, on record as prepared to end capital punishment, and several others are on the fence. But an excess of gubernatorial caution would be a mistake. Without a push by Mr. O’Malley himself, the status quo will remain unchanged and Maryland's death penalty will remain on the books.

"Session starts amid talk of death penalty repeal," is the AP report filed by Brian Witte.  It's via WTOP-FM.

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, a Calvert County Democrat who supports capital punishment, predicted a repeal would pass in the Senate, perhaps by as many as five votes. Miller also said he believed the measure would clear the General Assembly and be sent to the ballot for voters to decide in the next election.

"I'm confident that it will be on the ballot in 2014, and that the ultimate decision will be made by the people of the state of Maryland," Miller said.

Gov. Martin O'Malley said there has been a renewed interest from death penalty opponents to repeal capital punishment.

"It doesn't work," the Democrat said on the Marc Steiner Show on WEAA-FM. "It's expensive, and I believe it should be repealed."

House Speaker Michael Busch, D-Anne Arundel, also said he supports a repeal.

The Annapolis Capital Gazette reports, "Maryland's lawmakers go back to work," written by Earl Kelly and Pamela Wood.

The first day of the 433rd General Assembly on Wednesday was dedicated mostly to pomp and ceremony, but key lawmakers handicapped some of the looming fights on hot-button issues including a ban on the death penalty, an increase in gasoline taxes, and more gun regulations.

Gov. Martin O’Malley has made abolishing capital punishment one of his priorities, and Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr., D-Calvert, said a ban probably will pass in his chamber. Such bills have stalled in the Senate in prior years.

“It will go forward,” Miller, a supporter of capital punishment, told reporters soon after the session convened. “There are people that can be persuaded.”

Miller said any law that bans the death penalty likely will be petitioned to the November 2014 ballot.

The Senate president said he personally would like to see the ultimate penalty used for a wider range of homicides, including the killing of a teacher or prison guard.

"Death penalty and taxes: State session opens with weighty issues on the table," is the Frederick News-Post report by By Bethany Rodgers.

Talk of death penalty repeal and the need for transportation funding surrounded the Wednesday opening of the Maryland General Assembly's 2013 session.

As usual, the 90-day session started with ceremonial votes, visits from dignitaries and polite applause, but the camaraderie could soon buckle under the weight of some heavy issues, said Sen. David Brinkley.

A death penalty repeal is one of the measures that will stir up emotions and generate intense debate, lawmakers said.

After the Legislature broke for the day, Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. told reporters he believed the repeal would pass his chamber, though it has faced roadblocks in the past.

"I think that there's a mood of change," he said.

The repeal could squeak through the 47-member Senate with as few as 24 votes or attract as many as 26, he added.

Sen. Ron Young, who represents part of Frederick County, is one of the lawmakers whose vote could be in the balance.

The state law now in place permits the death penalty only when there is DNA evidence, a videotaped confession or a videotape implicating someone in a murder.

Young said Wednesday he is happy with the rules now on the books.

"Carroll legislators weigh in on possible death penalty repeal," by Christian Alexandersen for the Carroll County Times.

While all seven members of the Carroll County Delegations to the Maryland General Assembly have supported the state’s death penalty, not all of them are against the possibility of repealing it.

On Wednesday, delegates and senators from around the state met in Annapolis to begin the 90-day legislative session. And although no legislation has been introduced to do it, repealing the state’s death penalty has become a hot topic. Some of Carroll’s representatives have already decided not to support a repeal, while others are open to the idea.

Earlier coverage of the Maryland legislative session begins at the link.  The state currently has a moratorium on executions since it lacks a lethal injection procedure.

North Carolina & the Racial Justice Act

"Intentional Bias in North Carolina," was the December 26 editorial in the New York Times.

A North Carolina trial judge recently resentenced three death-row inmates to life without parole under the state’s Racial Justice Act, which allows inmates to have their sentences reduced if it can be shown they were tainted by racial bias. In the trials of two blacks and one Lumbee Indian, the judge found “powerful evidence”of such bias.

The law does not require proof that the bias was deliberate. But, in this case, the judge found “intentional” prosecutorial bias aimed at securing a death sentence for the defendants, bringing grave “harm to African-Americans and to the integrity of the justice system.”

The bias was manifested in the prosecutors’ use of peremptory strikes of prospective jurors during the jury selection process. In one case, the prosecutor struck prospective blacks at two times the rate for whites. In each of the other two cases, the rate was almost four times greater. Even when adjustments were made for other factors, like the criminal record of a prospective juror, race was “a significant factor” in the rigorous ways that the North Carolina statute required the defendants to prove.

The judge found that words and deed of the prosecutors themselves confirmed his conclusions about racial influence in the jury selection process.

And:

The judge observed that the injustice abundantly proven in each case was common throughout North Carolina during the past two decades. Prosecutors excluded blacks from juries for going to church too often or for other reasons that “simply make no sense” and that could be explained only by intentional and ugly bias.

The Wilmington Star News published the editorial, "Racial Justice Act needed to ensure equal treatment under law," also on December 26.

No matter one’s opinion of the death penalty, the Constitution requires fairness in meting out justice. That process cannot be fair if race was a factor in sentencing, as a Superior Court judge determined earlier this month in commuting the death sentences of three convicted killers to life in prison.

It was the second test of the Racial Justice Act and the first argued since the General Assembly restricted the use of certain data and made it harder for death row inmates to prove sentencing bias.

Superior Court Judge Gregory Weeks of Fayetteville was instantly criticized for finding that race played a significant role in imposing the death sentence. But his ruling commuting their sentences to life without parole was clear: “This conclusion is based primarily on the words and deeds of the prosecutors involved in these cases,” he told the courtroom. “Despite protestations to the contrary, their words, their deeds, speak volumes.”

And:

Our justice system contains boundaries that prosecutors and law officers must abide by. They do not get to tweak the system for people they think deserve the ultimate punishment. Doing so sullies the entire justice system.

Also looking at the RJA cases, ChapelBoro posted, "Kinnaird On Recent Racial Justice Act Case: 'It Was A Good Outcome'," by Anne Brenner.

Senator Ellie Kinnaird has been a longtime advocate for fairness in death penalty sentences—and she’s speaking in favor of one particular recent decision that involved the newly-revised racial justice act.

Earlier this month, Superior Court Judge Greg Weeks re-sentenced three death penalty inmates to life in prison, after he concluded that race was a factor in their original sentencing. Kinnaird says this case points out why all death penalty cases must be carefully examined.

“These were heinous crimes, and a lot of people feel that the only penalty that’s fitting for a heinous crime is the death penalty,” she says. “But the death penalty has so many flaws in it, and this case showed one of them, which is that there has been racial bias.”

Earlier coverage of North Carolina's Racial Justice Act begins at the link; also available, other North Carolina coverage.

More From North Carolina

"NC Murder Rates, Death Penalty Both See Declines," is Stephanie Carroll Carson post at the North Carolina Public News Service.

In the wake of the recent Connecticut school shootings, there is some positive news to report about deaths in North Carolinap>

The state's murder rate is down once again this year, its sixth without an execution. Also this year, for the first time in 35 years, no jury sentenced an inmate to Death Row.

Tye Hunter, executive director of the Center for Death Penalty Litigation, says there are better uses for the more than $10 million spent annually on pursuing death-penalty cases.

In court time and in prosecutors' time, it's a huge amount of money. And it's really just, at this point, going for nothing."

Hunter says issues in the state's crime lab, along with juries' greater skepticism of evidence presented by prosecutors are among the contributing factors to the absence of death-penalty sentences. He says money spent in litigating these cases could be used for victims' families or for education in the state.

Hunter says it's also important to remember that jurors are dismissed from capital murder cases if they say they are opposed to the death penalty.

So, you've only got people on the jury who can say, 'I could give the death penalty in the appropriate case.' And yet, in case after case after case, they're finding this isn't an appropriate case."

Earlier coverage from North Carolina begins at the link.

At the United Nations

"Record backing expected for UN anti-death penalty vote," is the AFP report.

A record number of countries are expected to back a UN General Assembly call for a moratorium on capital punishment on Thursday, diplomats said.

The vote held every two years now sees the likes of the United States, Japan, China, Iran and Iraq stuck in a shrinking minority as pressure grows for an end to executions.

About 150 countries now have at least a moratorium on capital punishment and just 21 were reported to have carried out executions in 2011, according to rights groups.

European nations have pressed hard for votes backing a moratorium at the UN vote. Norway's ambassador Geir Pedersen said there could be 112 or 113 countries in favor this year, up from 107 in 2010.

But Pedersen said the growing numbers supporting a moratorium show "this is no longer dominated by western countries. This is a global campaign."

"The importance of the vote is that it sends a very strong message to the international community across the board," Pedersen told AFP. "The General Assembly is the one place where all nations are represented and you have a strong majority in favor of a moratorium."

"There is a global trend toward fewer countries executing people and for us, it is an important issue of principle," the ambassador added.

And:

The General Assembly will also have votes Thursday on human rights in Syria, Iran and North Korea where western nations hope that big majorities will put increased political pressure on the governments.

Earlier coverage from the United Nations begins at the link.  Related posts are in the international category index.

News Coverage of North Carolina RJA Ruling

Today's Fayetteville Observer publishes the editorial, "Racial justice begins with a just society."

So: Are some crimes so heinous that it doesn't matter if race laid a finger on the scales of justice?

At an even more basic level, who are our models? Who is it that we wish to be like? Sworn officers going in harm's way to protect the public? Responsible women getting off work at the end of their shifts? Or thugs indulging the homicidal impulse of the moment?

It is a choice and we do have to make it.

The hearings under the state's Racial Justice Act were not about guilt; guilt was established years ago, and was not revisited by Superior Court Judge Gregory Weeks. In fact, under the statute he had no authority to revisit it; it was to be death or life, and racial taint, if any, was the only consideration.

Nor was this about sympathy for the perpetrators. Weeks spoke not of mercy, only about the hope that "acknowledgment of the ugly truth of race discrimination revealed by Defendants' evidence is the first step in creating a system of justice that is free from the pernicious influence of race, a system that truly lives up to our ideal of equal justice under the law."

That's another choice we cannot evade.

For the judge it was about individual cases, to which he applied the standards of both the original act and the more restrictive one crafted this year. The rest of us have trouble seeing past Golphin, Walters and Augustine, but it's about us, too, about people who have collectively decided not to be the kind of society that reveres justice only until it impedes our wrath.

News coverage of the ruling begins with the New York Times, "Judge in North Carolina Voids 3 Death Sentences," by Campbell Robertson.

A judge in North Carolina on Thursday ruled that race had played a significant role in the sentencing of three convicted murderers to death, and changed their sentences to life in prison without possibility of parole. It was the second such decision under the state’s Racial Justice Act and the first since the act was amended by the state legislature.

Lawyers representing Tilmon Golphin, Christina Walters and Quintel Augustine had argued under both the new and old versions of the act, contending that statistics as well as anecdotal and documentary evidence, like handwritten notes by prosecutors, showed that race influenced the sentencing process and particularly the picking of juries.

“In the writing of prosecutors long buried in case files and brought to light for the first time in this hearing, the court finds powerful evidence of race consciousness and race-based decision making,” wrote Judge Gregory Weeks of Cumberland County Superior Court, who also ruled last April in the first case to be heard under the Racial Justice Act.

According to a report on local TV station WRAL, the brother of a state trooper killed by Mr. Golphin had to be removed from the courtroom, shouting, “Judge, you had your mind made up before this ever started!”

The Wall Street Journal Law Blog posts, "Three More Spared Death Penalty Under Controversial NC Law," by Ashby Jones.

Defense lawyers and prosecutors disagree on which version of the law may be used. It wasn’t immediately clear Thursday which version Judge Weeks relied on.

In the meantime, no jury in North Carolina has come back with a death sentence this year, and there are no more capital cases on the 2012 docket. That’s the first time since the death penalty was reinstated in North Carolina that a jury has not sentenced at least one person to execution. 

"Judge commutes three death sentences; cites bias," is the AP filing, via the Elizabeth City Daily Advance.

A North Carolina judge on Thursday commuted the death sentences of three convicted killers, including two who killed law enforcement officers, to life in prison without the possibility of parole after ruling that race played an unjust role in jury selection at their trials.

N.C. Superior Court Judge Gregory A. Weeks in Cumberland County based his ruling on evidence presented over four weeks of hearings that he says showed prosecutors in each case made a concerted effort to reduce the number of black jurors.

The three who had their sentences commuted were among the most notorious killers on North Carolina's death row. Two had killed law enforcement officers.

Family members of the victims and more than 60 uniformed police officers packed the courtroom. Before Weeks could finish issuing his ruling, the brother of a murdered state trooper stood up and yelled an expletive at the judge.

The Republican-controlled Legislature recently scaled back the state's Racial Justice Act, on which Thursday's ruling was based. Weeks said his ruling applies under both the old and new laws.

He cited evidence that included handwritten notes of prosecutors indicating they worked to get blacks eliminated from the pool of jurors, resulting in panels that were overwhelmingly white.

"This conclusion is based primarily on the words and deeds of the prosecutors involved in these cases," Weeks, who is black, said from the bench. "Despite protestations to the contrary, their words, their deeds, speak volumes. During presentation of evidence, the court finds powerful and persuasive evidence of racial consciousness, race-based decision making in the writings of prosecutors long buried in the case files and brought to light for the first time during this hearing."

"Judge finds racial bias played a role in three death row cases," is by Anne Blythe for the News & Observer.

Attorneys for the defendants argued during a nine-day hearing in October that prosecutors had systematically tried to prevent blacks from serving on the juries for the trials. The defense team presented statistics and handwritten notes from prosecutors’ case files to bolster its contentions.

Prosecutors argued racial bias did not play a role in the cases. They challenged statistical evidence that shows prosecutors at the time of the trials systematically struck potential black jurors from sitting on juries in capital cases in Cumberland County and across North Carolina.

Prosecutors plan to appeal the ruling, as they did in the case of Marcus Reymond Robinson, the first death row inmate to successfully challenge and have his sentence converted to life without parole under the Racial Justice Act.

The state Supreme Court is scheduled to announce this month whether it will hear the Robinson case.

"Cumberland County judge rules in favor of 3 death row inmates in Racial Justice Act cases," by Paul Woolverton in the Fayetteville Observer.

Walters, Augustine and Golphin are the second, third and fourth people to win Racial Justice Act claims since the state legislature adopted the law in 2009. The first was Marcus Reymond Robinson of Fayetteville; Weeks commuted his sentence in April.

Another 144 death row defendants have Racial Justice Act claims pending. Eight condemned men are not attempting to use the law.

The law, which the Republican-controlled legislature revised this year to make it harder for defendants to win claims, allows condemned inmates of any race to advance a claim that institutional racism led to their death sentences.

In light of the law, studies have found that people who kill whites are more likely to be sentenced to death than those who kill nonwhites. And, studies have shown, blacks who favor the death penalty are blocked by prosecutors from serving on capital juries far more often than whites.

Prosecutors contend that the studies are flawed. The aggregate results of the studies ignore that each case, and each decision to strike a juror, is unique, they argue.

Weeks said his ruling falls under terms of both the 2009 version of the Racial Justice Act and this year's revision.

"Judge: Race a factor in picking juries for death penalty cases," is the WRAL-TV report by Bryan Mims.

Lawyers for Christina "Queen" Walters, Tilmon Golphin and Quintel Augustine argued at a hearing in October that statistics and handwritten notes from prosecutors show racial bias in jury selection. Golphin and Augustine are black, while Walters is Native American.

Superior Court Judge Greg Weeks agreed with their motions for re-sentencing under the state's Racial Justice Act, saying there was "powerful and unmistakable" evidence of race-conscious jury selection.

"Although they have committed heinous crimes, they were sentenced to death in a process that was focused more on obtaining death sentences than it was in ensuring the process was fair," Weeks said.

Notes from the trials showed that prosecutors used racially charged terms and struck qualified minorities from juries at double the rate than whites, the judge said. He dismissed prosecutors' arguments that every choice of selecting jurors is unique and cannot be pinned on racial bias.

"The court finds no joy in these conclusions," he said. "Indeed, the court cannot overstate the gravity and somber nature of its findings, nor can the court overstate the harm to African-American citizens and to the integrity of the justice system that results from racially discriminatory jury selection practices."

The brother of Highway Patrol Trooper Ed Lowry, whom Golphin and his brother, Kevin, killed in 1997 while fleeing arrest, had to be removed from the Cumberland County courtroom after he cursed at Weeks.

Earlier coverage of the ruling and the North Carolina RJA begins at the link.

Arkansas Legislature to Attempt Lethal Injection Fix

"Prisons Officials Seek Fix to Arkansas Execution Law," is the AP report, via Arkansas Business.

Correction officials are trying to figure out how to rework Arkansas' lethal injection law after the state's top court threw out the statute earlier this year, officials told legislators Tuesday.

"We know we're going to be challenged on whatever we come up with, but we're looking for guidance from other states, the federal bureau and the attorney general's office," Department of Correction Director Ray Hobbs told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. "We're just trying to come up with something that we think will allow us to carry out executions."

Hobbs' visit to the Capitol on Tuesday came after the Arkansas Supreme Court June sided with a number of death row inmates who argued that the 2009 law violated part of the state's constitution that deals with separating the branches of government.

"The court concluded that the existing statute violated the separation of powers doctrine in the Arkansas Constitution by delegating too much authority to the Department of Correction, but it was very vague in how the statute should be changed," Deputy Attorney General Dennis Hansen told legislators Tuesday.

The 2009 law said death sentences are to be carried out by lethal injection of one or more chemicals that the director of the Department of Correction chooses.

It's not clear exactly what will replace the law, but Hansen said it may be enough to remove language granting the Department of Correction's director discretion when it comes to choosing what kind of drug or drugs are used in lethal injections.

"State’s lethal injection law under revision," is by Rob Moritz for the Arkansas News Bureau.

A rewrite of Arkansas’ execution law is in the works for consideration in the upcoming General Assembly, lawmakers heard Tuesday.

The state Supreme Court struck down the law this year, saying the Legislature “abdicated its responsibility” by giving the Department of Correction too much enforcement discretion in violation of the separation of powers doctrine.

Deputy Attorney General Dennis Hansen told the Senate Judiciary Committee the 2009 law is being rewritten to address the high court decision. The Legislature convenes Jan. 14.

“The Supreme Court said the Legislature had given the Department of Correction too much discretion in choosing the drug, or drugs, that would be administered as part of lethal injection,” Hansen said, adding the attorney general’s office is working with prison officials “to come up with one that we think will best meet the rulings of both the Arkansas State Supreme Court and the United States Supreme Court.”

The Methods of Execution Act, which the Legislature approved in 2009, stated that a death sentence is to be carried out by lethal injection using one or more chemicals “as determined in kind and amount in the discretion of the director of the Department of Correction.”

The law said the chemicals could be one or more ultra short-acting barbiturates; one or more chemical paralytic agents; potassium chloride; and “any other chemical or chemicals, including but not limited to, saline solution.”

In 2011, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Tim Fox struck down the phrase “any other chemical or chemicals including but not limited to” as unconstitutional. The state Supreme Court in June upheld Fox’s ruling.

Earlier coverage of Arkansas lethal injection issues begins at the link.  Related posts are in the lethal injection index.

The Oregon Debate

"Voters need a public debate about the death penalty in Oregon," is the title of Ron Steiner's OpEd in the Oregonian.  He's the chair of Oregonians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

It is wonderful to see that district attorneys Joshua Marquis and Steven Atchison acknowledge that Oregonians should vote on whether we should continue to support a death penalty ("The death penalty conversation isn't new for Oregon," Commentary, Dec. 3). Those of us opposed to the death penalty have been seeking that debate for some time now.

And:

Voters today are concerned about the many mistakes that have been made in the administration of the death penalty and the risk of executing an innocent person. Voters are also concerned about the fairness of the administration of the death penalty, considering that nationwide, fewer than 2 percent of those convicted of aggravated murder get a death penalty. Of those who do, an overwhelming number are poor, and a disproportionate percentage of them are people of color. 

Voters today, progressive and conservative alike, are concerned about the tremendous cost of supporting a failed public policy that offers no benefit to the citizens, except maybe revenge for those who wrongly think that an execution will in some way deter violent crime and murder.

Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link.

More From North Carolina

Today's Fayetteville Observer reports, "Capital punishment under close scrutiny in Fayetteville, statewide."  It's a comprehensive look at the current climate in North Carolina written by Paul Woolverton.

Convicted murderer Marcus Robinson of Fayetteville was hours away from execution in 2007.

But his life was spared by a court-ordered stay to give him and other death row inmates a chance to challenge the constitutionality of the state's method of execution.

The delay turned into an unofficial moratorium on executions that nearly six years later remains unresolved in the courts.

For Robinson, the delay provided enough time to save him from the executioner's needle. This year, he became the first - and, so far, the only - North Carolina death row inmate to use a new law, the Racial Justice Act of 2009, to have his death sentence commuted to life in prison without parole.

Now, the Racial Justice Act, other changes to death penalty law and a decline in jurors' willingness to sentence inmates to death are raising questions about the future of executions in the state. It's unclear when the state will resume administering its ultimate punishment.

And:

According to an Elon University poll, a majority of state residents support the death penalty. But statistics show a growing reluctance to hand down the penalty in court.

In 1999, 24 people were sentenced to death. In 2009, two were sentenced. This year, no one has been sentenced to death in the state, and no more capital trials are scheduled this year.

This will be the first year since the 1977 law when no one in the state has been sentenced to die.

Jurors are not as likely these days to hand down a death sentence, said Ken Rose, a lawyer with the Center for Death Penalty Litigation.

In 1994, North Carolina eliminated parole for people sentenced to life in prison. Rose thinks that when jurors are comfortable that a killer will never go free, they are less prone to vote for death.

An AP condensed version of the report is, "No one new on N.C. death row in 2012."  It's via the Charlotte Observer.

North Carolina hasn't always been so ambivalent about executions. Juries in the state have sent 400 people to death row since the state's most recent death penalty law was passed in 1977. Forty-three of those people have been executed.

But the pace of new death sentences has slowed considerably. In 1999, 24 people were sentenced to death across North Carolina. In 2009, it dropped to two people, and this year, no new inmates will make it to death row.

Earlier coverage from North Carolina begins at the link.

Continued Decline in Ultimate Penalty to Be Applauded

That's the North Carolina editorial published by the Burlington Times-News.

In 2012, juries in North Carolina refused to sentence a single defendant to death, according to a report that recently appeared in the Raleigh News & Observer.

The report indicated that not only has no one been sentenced to death in the state during the year, but that no cases that could result in a death penalty are pending trial. That’s the first time the public has set something of a voluntary moratorium on the harshest of sentences in decades.

In 1977, North Carolina reinstated the death penalty after the then-current statute was declared unconstitutional. As a result, the prisoners on death row found their sentences commuted to life in prison, while members of the state legislature were sent back to the drawing board in order to reconfigure the statute in question. The law they settled upon remains the one that is used today when trying capital cases.

And, although North Carolina’s present death penalty statute has since been upheld by higher courts as constitutional, fewer and fewer juries find it to be the right solution, preferring instead the sentence of life imprisonment.

Earlier coverage from North Carolina begins at the link.

State Roundup

"Abandon executions: Death penalty unfair, illogical and costly," is the Lexington Herald-Leader OpEd written by Brian Cooney, an emeritus professor of philosophy at Centre College.

Last December, the ABA released the results of a two-year study by its Kentucky Assessment Team on the Death Penalty. The team included eight distinguished Kentucky jurists, two of whom were retired state supreme court judges. They unanimously recommended halting executions until "serious problems" were addressed. Among their disturbing findings.

And:

On Oct. 17, the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights, citing the findings of the ABA committee, sent to each member of the General Assembly and to the governor a resolution calling for outright abolition. It was this resolution that prompted the New York Times editorial also calling for abolition.

Why abolition rather than a moratorium to give us time to eliminate the abuses? Even reform of the death penalty system cannot rule out executions of innocent people. The injustice of a wrongful conviction can never be rectified if the convicted person is killed.

We have to ask ourselves what good we accomplish by executing murderers rather than imprisoning them for life without parole (a sentence available in Kentucky). There is no evidence to suggest that the death penalty has a greater deterrent effect than a life sentence.

"State moves away from death penalty," is the North Carolina editorial published by the Jacksonville Daily News.

In 2012, juries in North Carolina refused to sentence a single defendant to death, according to a report that recently appeared in the Raleigh News & Observer.

The report indicated that not only has no one been sentenced to death in the state during the year, but that no cases that could result in a death penalty are pending trial. That’s the first time the public has set something of a voluntary moratorium on the harshest of sentences in decades.

And:

While killing the perpetrator resolves the immediate problem, it leaves a moral blight on the culture that orders and condones such a killing. It is much more honorable to remove from society forever such a person, but not compound his or her crime by emulating it.

Seattle's KIRO-FM reports, "Relatives of murder victims oppose death penalty."  It's by Tim Haeck.

Relatives of murder victims in Washington hope their voices carry some extra weight in the debate over the death penalty.

Retiring State Senator Debbie Regala, D-Tacoma, was among a group of death penalty critics speaking out in Olympia Thursday. The six-term state lawmaker has a personal story to share.

"In 1980, my brother-in-law was murdered and his body was dumped in a park in Seattle," Regala told KIRO Radio. His killer was never prosecuted.

Still, she favors abolishing the death penalty. "We spend six to ten times as much money pursuing a death penalty as we would if we went for life without the possibility of parole," claimed Regala.

"When we look at the high cost, the staggering amount of money that gets spent on this, that money could be so much better used in giving police officers better tools to prevent crime, tools for helping solve some of these cold cases."

Earlier coverage from Kentucky, North Carolina, and Washington begins at the link.

Oregon Opinion Roundup

Today's Eugene Register-Guard publishes the editorial, "Revisit the death penalty."

Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland, is not widely known in Oregon outside the legislative halls in Salem and the Portland-area medical community. The founder and later director of the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research for 30 years, he also spent a decade as a professor and chair of preventive medicine at Portland’s Oregon Health & Science University. In 2002 he was elected to the Oregon House and has been re-elected five times.

There’s a good chance, however, that Greenlick’s name will become a household word in Oregon before the 2014 general election. That’s because he’s announced his intention to introduce a bill in the 2013 Legislature asking voters to amend the state constitution to eliminate Oregon’s death penalty and replace it with a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.

And:

There are a number of reasons capital punishment should be abolished, but chief among them is that an execution is irreversible, and sometimes the wrong person is convicted. By one tabulation 135 death penalty inmates in the United States have had their convictions reversed in the past 36 years, some on legal technicalities but increasingly because DNA testing revealed that the wrong person had been arrested, prosecuted, tried and found guilty.

It’s time for Oregonians to consider — again — rescinding the state’s death penalty. Replacing it with a life sentence and no possibility of parole should help make that happen. Greenlick’s proposal should pass the Legislature, be placed on the ballot and be approved by voters.

"Oregon's life-or-death vote," is the Oregonian editorial.

Oregon's laws on capital punishment aren't meant to be played as games of chess between governors and convicted killers. These laws also aren't intended to create more uncertainty and anguish for the families of victims.

This is precisely why Oregon voters need another chance to vote on the death penalty. Letting the rules change abruptly based on a governor's personal sentiments serves only to undermine confidence in the state's justice system.

State Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland, says he will introduce a bill during the 2013 legislative session that would propose a constitutional amendment to repeal the death penalty, as The Oregonian's Helen Jung reported last week. Under Greenlick's plan, Oregonians would vote on the amendment in November 2014.

And:

Five states -- New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois and New Mexico -- have abandoned the death penalty in recent years. Advances in DNA testing, combined with dogged advocacy work, have startled the public into realizing that dozens of innocent people have been wrongly sentenced to die based on faulty evidence and poor legal defense. Oregon has grown more liberal since its last vote on capital punishment about three decades ago, and it's possible to picture Oregon joining the ranks of the abolitionists.

 Oregon prosecutors Joshua Marquis and Steven Atchison write the OpEd, "Citizens and capital punishment: The death penalty conversation isn't new for Oregon," for the Oregonian.

There has been a very robust conversation going on for the 28 years of the "modern" era of capital punishment in Oregon -- in the courts; in the classrooms of high schools, colleges and law schools; in the Legislature; and on the street.

Oregon is the home to direct democracy, thanks to William U'Ren. In its editorial, The Oregonian lists five states that have stepped away from the death penalty in the past decade. What wasn't mentioned was that in not one of those states did the people vote to abolish the penalty. In Connecticut it was done despite more than 62 percent of voters saying they opposed the action, and in the other states it was either the action (as in Illinois) of a lame duck legislature or a state where the governor could exercise the power to abolish it.

Most states do not share Oregon's (and California's) belief that the ultimate voice belongs to the people. In the past 50 years in America, only three times have the people of any of these United States made a decision about whether to keep or abandon the death penalty. In 1964 Oregonians fairly convincingly voted to abolish the death penalty. In 1984 the same state voted even more emphatically to restore it. In 2012, in one of the most underreported stories of the election year, California turned away by a significant margin an effort to abolish the death penalty. More than $7 million was spent in that effort, against less than $300,000 for those seeking retention of the penalty.

The case of Kitzhaber's action in the Haugen case is being decided in the courts. Thus far, a respected judge, an opponent of capital punishment, has ruled that the governor had no right to grant a "reprieve" where none was asked, and now the governor is appealing that decision.

Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link.

Related posts are in the abolition and state legislation category indexes.

Will Maryland Be the Next State to Repeal?

"NAACP to step up Maryland death penalty fight," is by Michael Dresser for the Baltimore Sun.  Here's the beginning of the article.

The NAACP is vowing to mount in Annapolis its largest-ever effort to abolish the death penalty in a state, saying Maryland's historic role in the civil rights movement makes it an appropriate place for the push.

In an interview, NAACP President Ben Jealous said Maryland is the civil rights organization's top priority in its broader campaign to eliminate capital punishment from the American justice system. He said the group will spend more than it ever has in a state as it rallies citizens to pressure lawmakers for repeal.

"We'll make sure people hear from their constituents in a way they've never heard from them before," Jealous said.

The NAACP has historically opposed the death penalty for a variety of reasons, including racial disparities in how it is applied. Jealous said Maryland is especially important to the NAACP because of the state's civil rights history — including the careers of native sons Thurgood Marshall and Frederick Douglass.

"There's a special debt of honor to get this done in Maryland for the NAACP," Jealous said.

His announcement comes as Gov. Martin O'Malley, a death penalty opponent, is weighing whether to put the full weight of his office behind a renewed effort to shut down Maryland's Death Row. A previous O'Malley effort ended in 2009 with a compromise bill that narrowed the circumstances under which a killer can be sentenced to death but left capital punishment on the books.

Earlier coverage from Maryland begins at the link.

Oregon Legislation to Be Introduced

"Oregon legislator prepares death-penalty repeal bill, as anniversary of execution moratorium approaches," is the Oregonian report written by Helen Jung.

When Gov. John Kitzhaber declared a year ago that he would block any executions as long as he's governor, he also challenged legislators to help turn the moratorium into law.

The system is inequitable and immoral, said Kitzhaber, who made the announcement when he halted a pending execution for two-time killer Gary Haugen. "I am calling on the Legislature to bring potential reforms before the 2013 legislative session and encourage all Oregonians to engage in the long overdue debate that this important issue deserves," he said.

It's an invitation that state Rep. Mitch Greenlick, a longtime opponent of capital punishment, is happy to accept.

Greenlick plans to introduce a bill that would propose a constitutional amendment to repeal the death penalty, replacing it instead with a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

If legislators pass the bill, the proposed amendment would then go to a vote by Oregonians in the 2014 general election. Voters must approve a constitutional amendment by a simple majority.

Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link.

The Oregon Moratorium

Oregon Public Radio KLCC-FM reports, "One Year After Death Penalty Moratorium, Little Has Happened."  It's by Chris Lehman.

One year ago this week, Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber stunned the state and made international headlines when he issued a moratorium on the death penalty. He said he hoped his action would spur state lawmakers to a conversation about the death penalty. But so far, there's little momentum for the legislature to act on the issue.

Kitzhaber called Oregon's capital punishment system "compromised and inequitable." He said the ban on executions would last through the end of his time in office.

And he said "I call on the legislative branch to bring forth potential reforms to the 2013 legislature."

A full repeal of the death penalty would require approval by voters. Lawmakers could send such a measure to the ballot, or make changes to how the death penalty is applied.

But so far, Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Floyd Prozanski says there's been relatively little discussion on the issue.

Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link.

Capital Punishment and North Carolina

There is a moratorium on exectutions in North Carolina due to lethal injection issues.  One death sentence was overturned earlier this year under the state's Racial Justice Act.

The Raleigh News & Observer reports, "No one sentenced to death in North Carolina this year."  It's written by Anne Blythe.

As North Carolina politicians engaged in rigorous debate this year about whether capital punishment should exist, the juries that actually decide death-penalty cases made a statement of their own.

No jury in North Carolina has come back with a death sentence this year, and there are no more capital cases on the 2012 docket.

That’s the first time since 1977, when the death penalty was reinstated in this state, that a jury has not sentenced at least one person to execution.

“The idea that we’ve come this far in 35 years is a powerful statement of where the public is at in North Carolina,” said Ken Rose, an attorney at the Center for Death Penalty Litigation and a death penalty critic. “It’s a verdict on the death penalty.”

And:

The record-low of four capital trials in North Carolina comes at a time when many states are wrestling with proposals to abolish capital punishment.

In 2004, the courts declared the death penalty to be unconstitutional in New York. In 2007, New Jersey repealed its death penalty law, with New Mexico following suit in 2009 and Illinois in 2011. This year, the Connecticut legislature passed a bill to abandon the death penalty for future convictions, but the 11 men on death row may still be executed.

But in California this week, 53 percent of the voters rejected a ballot initiative to repeal the death penalty and move all death row inmates to life in prison without possibility of parole.

Though North Carolina has not put such questions about the death penalty on the ballot, there has been a de-facto moratorium on executions since 2006, when a series of lawsuits were filed challenging the fairness and humanity of the state-sponsored executions.

Earlier coverage from North Carolina begins at the link.

Oregon Supreme Court to Review Reprieve Issue

Today's Salem Statesman Journal reports, "Oregon Supreme Court to hear Haugen case appeal."  It's by Peter Wong.

The Oregon Supreme Court has agreed to hear Gov. John Kitzhaber’s appeal of Gary Haugen’s refusal to accept a reprieve of a death sentence.

Oral arguments are scheduled at 10:30 a.m. March 14 at the University of Oregon law school. The court normally hears arguments annually at each of the state’s three law schools.

The justices will hear arguments on a single point: Whether someone such as Haugen must accept a reprieve offered by the governor under the Oregon Constitution for it to be effective.

Kitzhaber issued the reprieve on Nov. 22, 2011, two weeks before Haugen was scheduled to be executed at the Oregon State Penitentiary. Haugen had waived further legal appeals, and has said he wants to die.

Haugen sued Kitzhaber, arguing that he had a right to refuse a reprieve, unlike a pardon or commutation. A judge agreed with him Aug. 3, and set the execution back on track.

However, a second date for an execution cannot proceed in Marion County Circuit Court until the current civil lawsuit is concluded. The Supreme Court hearing will bypass the Court of Appeals.

"Oregon Supreme Court agrees to hear appeal in Haugen execution case," by Helen Jung in the Oregonian.

The state's highest court has agreed to hear Gov. John Kitzhaber's appeal of a decision that ruled his reprieve last November of death-row inmate Gary Haugen's execution was invalid.

Kitzhaber's attorney had sought review by the Oregon Supreme Court because of the nature of the case, which focuses on the scope of the governor's authority. Typically, the Oregon Court of Appeals would be the first venue, but appellate judges, as well as Haugen's attorney, endorsed the request for the Supreme Court to take the case.

KATU-TV posts the AP filing, "Haugen death penalty fight heads to Oregon Supreme Court."

Gary Haugen says he wants to die and has stopped appealing his aggravated murder conviction.  

Gov. John Kitzhaber has vowed there will be no executions while he is governor. He issued the reprieve in November of last year.

A Marion County Circuit Court judge ruled in August that Haugen has the right to refuse the reprieve. The governor's appeal went straight to the state supreme court. 

Earlier coverage of the Oregon case begins at the link.

Today is European and World Day Against the Death Penalty

"European and World Day against the Death Penalty – EU underlines commitment to universal abolition," is the European Union news release:

Today is World and European Day against the Death Penalty. The European Union is opposed to the use of capital punishment in all cases and under any circumstances. Its universal abolition is one of the key objectives of EU human rights policy.

Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice-President of the Commission, said: "Capital punishment is a cruel, inhumane and irreversible action that violates the basic human right to life and dignity. In the case of any miscarriage of justice, from which no legal system is immune, it represents a terrible and irreversible loss of human life. The death penalty can neither reverse the crime it seeks to punish nor mitigate a victim's loss. It should be a relic of the past."

The European Union regularly reaffirms its opposition to the death penalty and uses the various diplomatic tools at its disposal – including statements, demarches and Human Rights Dialogues with its partners – to advance the cause of worldwide abolition. The movement towards abolition is one of the top priorities in its recently adopted Strategic Framework and Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy, as well as under the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR).

While global momentum continues to build toward abolition, 20 of the 58 retentionist countries around the world continue to carry out executions at an alarming rate. Where the death penalty still exists, the EU calls for its use to be progressively restricted and to respect internationally-agreed minimum standards.

The EU's campaign against the death penalty is equally active in multilateral fora such as the United Nations and is contributing to the adoption of the 67th United Nations General Assembly resolution on a moratorium on use of the death penalty. The EU continues to encourage all States to accede to the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the most fundamental UN international instrument for the abolition of death penalty.

As well as leading contributions to the efforts of civil society organisations aimed at the abolition of the death penalty, the EU is the first regional body to have adopted rules prohibiting trade in goods used for capital punishment (or torture and ill-treatment), as well as on the supply of technical assistance related to such goods.

The EU also notes, "EU Policy on the Death Penalty."

The European Union holds a strong and principled position against the death penalty; its abolition is a key objective for the Union’s human rights policy. Abolition is, of course, also a pre-condition for entry into the Union.

Indeed, the EU is the leading institutional actor and largest donor to the fight against the death penalty. This commitment is outlined clearly in the EU Guidelines on the death penalty, the first ever human rights guidelines adopted by Council, in 1998. The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice President of the European Commission Catherine Ashton has also indicated that abolishing capital punishment worldwide is a ‘personal priority’.

The death penalty is cruel and inhuman, and has not been shown in any way to act as a deterrent to crime. The European Union regards abolition as essential for the protection of human dignity, as well as for the progressive development of human rights.

If necessary, the EU advocates a moratorium as a first step towards abolition. The adoption of a resolution on this issue by the UN General Assembly in 2007 was a major breakthrough, while growing support for subsequent resolutions adopted in 2008 and 2010 has served to illustrate the worldwide trend in this direction.

Where the capital punishment is still used, the EU calls for it to be progressively restricted and insists that it be carried out according to international minimum standards.

The EU intervenes both on individual cases and at a general policy level when a country's policy on the death penalty is in flux. In 2009 alone, the EU issued statements on over 30 individual cases and carried out more than 30 other actions in favour of individuals at risk of execution.

EU funding also allows non-governmental organisations to campaign for the abolition of the death penalty. Projects may range from the monitoring of the use of the death penalty to assistance to prisoners, support for constitutional reform, training, advocacy and awareness-raising campaigns.

RTT News posts, "EU Calls For Universal Moratorium On Death Penalty."

The European Union and the Council of Europe have urged all countries which still retain the death penalty to immediately declare a moratorium on executions as a first step towards its abolition.

They also called on all countries to support the resolution on a global moratorium on death penalty, which will be put to a vote at the 67th session of the United Nations General Assembly in December.

"Capital punishment is inhumane and unnecessary. Experience has also shown that it does not serve as a deterrent to crime. No legal system is flawless; any miscarriage of justice could lead to the tragic loss of an innocent life," Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary-General of the Council of Europe, and European Union Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton said in a Joint declaration issued on Wednesday on the occasion of the European and World Day against the Death Penalty.

They recalled that "abolition of the death penalty throughout Europe, and beyond, is an objective common to all our member states," noting that "no execution has taken place in our member-states in the last 15 years."

"Swiss leads call to abolish death penalty," is by AFP.

Six countries joined forces on Wednesday to call for the “complete abolition” of the death penalty worldwide.

Launched at Switzerland's initiative on the 10th World Day against the Death Penalty, foreign minister Didier Burkhalter signed the appeal along with his counterparts from Germany, France, Liechtenstein, Austria and Italy.

“We intend to work together ... to ensure that the number of executions continues to decline, that judicial proceedings are made more transparent, and that further countries renounce the death penalty until this inhumane form of punishment has disappeared entirely,” read the appeal, published in numerous European dailies.

More than 130 countries have abolished or put a moratorium on the death penalty but 50 nations continued to condone it, the statement said.

And:

In 2010, the UN General Assembly adopted, by 109 votes to 41, a third resolution on the moratorium on the death penalty.

This resolution - coming after earlier proposals adopted in 2007 and 2008 - was introduced by the six nations involved in Wednesday's appeal along with the European Union and numerous other countries around the world.

This is the 10th annual World Day Against the Death Penalty.  Related posts are in the international category index.

From David Love of Witness to Innocence

"Terry Williams Case Highlights the Need For Death Penalty Moratorium," is the title of David Love's latest Huffington Post essay.  He's the Executive Director of Witness to Innocence.

When Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina stayed the execution of Terry Williams, she dealt a blow to the death penalty in Pennsylvania. Now the public has caught a glimpse of prosecutorial misconduct and evidence suppression in the application of the death penalty, and it isn't pretty.

In her order, Judge Sarmina -- a former prosecutor -- issued a scathing indictment of the prosecutor in that case for hiding evidence that Amos Norwood was allegedly, a sexual predator who had molested Williams and other children.

Sarmina said "evidence has plainly been suppressed," and accused former assistant D.A. Andrea Foulkes of engaging in "gamesmanship" and "playing fast and loose." The judge also said Foulkes "had no problem disregarding her ethical obligations" in an attempt to win.

And:

With 200 people condemned to death, Pennsylvania has the fourth largest death row in America. With no voluntary executions in the state in half a century, the tragic story of Terry Williams has reopened the debate on capital punishment. We do not know how many of death row inmates would be free or serving a lesser sentence, but for an ethically challenged prosecutor who believed in winning over seeking justice. Given what we know, now is as good a time as any to shut down Pennsylvania's broken death machine.

Earlier coverage of Terry Williams case begins at the link

Three More North Carolina Cases Get RJA Review

"Racial Justice Act witness Barbara O'Brien says statistics show blacks excused more than whites in capital cases," is by Paul Woolverton for today's Fayetteville Observer.

A university researcher testified on Tuesday that race influenced prosecutors' decisions to reject black jurors from serving on three of Cumberland County's most notorious murder trials.

Between 1990 and August 2010, the race of potential jurors "was a significant factor" in whether prosecutors struck them from death penalty cases, Michigan State University law professor Barbara O'Brien testified at a Racial Justice Act hearing for the three defendants.

The three defendants, Christina Walters, Quintel Augustine and Tilmon Golphin, are on death row. They are attempting to use the N.C. Racial Justice Act to prove racism was a factor that led to their death sentences.

If they win, their sentences will be converted to life in prison without parole.

And:

O'Brien co-authored a statistical study of North Carolina death penalty cases. It says prosecutors have a pattern of using peremptory challenges to block blacks from serving on the juries of capital murder trials. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that potential jurors may not be struck peremptorily because of their race.

O'Brien testified that race was a significant factor in prosecutors' jury selection decisions statewide, locally and in the three defendants' trials. The results "support an inference of intentional discrimination" on the part of the prosecutors, she said.

Statewide, black jurors were twice as likely to be dismissed, she said. They also were twice as likely to be dismissed in Golphin's trial, she said.

At Walters' trial, blacks were struck 3.6 times as often, O'Brien said, and 3.7 times as often during Augustine's trial.

Prosecutors sometimes seat death-penalty qualified jurors who still express reservations about it.

Statewide, O'Brien said, 9.7 percent of black jurors with death penalty reservations were approved by prosecutors versus 26.4 percent of non-black jurors.

In Cumberland County blacks with reservations about the death penalty were seated by prosecutors 5.9 percent of the time, versus 26.3 percent of the time for non-black jurors with such reservations, O'Brien said.

O'Brien analyzed the jury selection patterns both under the Racial Justice Act of 2009 and a the more restrictive version that lawmakers passed this summer after a convicted murderer from Fayetteville used the 2009 law to get off death row.

There is dispute over which version of the law applies to Walters, Golphin and Augustine, so O'Brien analyzed their cases under both versions of the law. Under both standards, she said, she found racial bias.

Earlier coverage of the trial, which started Monday, includes:

"Racial Justice Act hearing: Defense focuses on picks for jury," from the Tuesday Fayetteville Observer, also by Woolverton.

The AP filing, "Opening statements in Racial Justice Act cases," Monday evening, via the Greenville Daily Reflector.

This week's hearing marks the second test of the Racial Justice Act, which lawmakers heavily revised this session. Earlier this year, Marcus Reymond Robinson became the first prisoner removed from death row under the law.

The landmark 2009 law allowed death row prisoners to use statistics to show that racial bias influenced their sentences, but the Republican-led General Assembly overrode Gov. Beverly Perdue's veto this summer to roll back much of the law.

"Judge hears three NC Racial Justice Act cases," by Bryan Mims for WRAL-TV.

Today's Wilmington Star reports, "Unresolved challenges put death penalty on hold in N.C."  It's by Brian Freskos.

North Carolina has not executed an inmate in six years because issues with the state medical board and unresolved litigation have led to a de facto moratorium. So while the state continues to pay for costly capital trials, no one is actually being put to death.

New Hanover County District Attorney Ben David, who is also president of the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys, said the moratorium has become a point of concern among prosecutors. "Any decision to move forward (with the death penalty) has to include a frank discussion with the victim's family about the realistic possibility of the punishment being carried out," he said.

And:

With 46 executions since 1976, North Carolina had been among the most active users of capital punishment, according to data from the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center, based in Washington, D.C.

But recent years have seen a turnaround. Even before the state's moratorium took hold, executions had grown exceedingly rare for several reasons. The number of death sentences handed out has trended downward since 2000, dropping from 18 that year to three in 2007, according to Isaac Unah, a political science professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The decline coincides with the state's creation of the Office of Indigent Defense Services, which scholars say is the single biggest contributor to the drop.

The office has led to enhancements in the way poor defendants are represented.

Earlier coverage of the North Carolina Racial Justice Act begins at the link.  Related posts are in the race index.

More From Missouri

Today's Kansas City Star reports, "Missouri’s one-drug execution plan draws some critical looks."  It's written by Tony Rizzo.

Even widespread use of lethal injection as an alternative to methods such as the gas chamber, the gallows or electrocution provided only a humane veneer to what essentially is an inhumane act: the taking of another person's life.

Some death-penalty experts, both pro and con, even argue that the firing squad's bullet to the heart is as quick and pain-free as any other killing method.

"Any manner of killing someone," Deborah Denno, a law professor at Fordham University in New York, "is going to involve some kind of pain."

The constitutional question is what level of pain is acceptable before it morphs into "cruel and unusual."

That has clogged the courts and delayed for years executions for convicted killers such as Nunley and Taylor.

"It's wrong to equate humane with painless," said New York Law School professor Robert Blecker. "Some people deserve a quick but painful death."

Today, that ongoing debate centers squarely on Missouri.

And:

While Denno opposes the death penalty and Blecker advocates it, the two professors share the belief that there is a feasible alternative.

"We agree that if you're going to have the death penalty, probably the most appropriate method is the firing squad," Blecker said.

The state of Utah has carried out three executions by firing squad since 1977, most recently in 2010, and Denno said in none of those cases was any undue suffering reported.

"It's probably as painless a method as we have," she said.

Denno also sees it as a more honest approach to carrying out a death sentence.

"You can't have it both ways," she said. "You can't execute people while pretending that they're just falling asleep."

For Blecker, one of the most galling aspects of execution by lethal injection is the resemblance to a medical setting. He made a critique on that point in his essay "Killing Them Softly: Meditations on a Painful Punishment of Death."

"AG Koster Fighting State Supreme Court Over Execution Hold-Ups," is the MissouriNet post by Austin Robertson.  It's via KTTS-FM.

The debate over the death penalty is back in the spotlight in Jefferson City. Attorney General Chris Koster is pressing the state supreme court to act on a pending lawsuit concerning death row inmates.

Proposals have been made in the legislature for a death penalty moratorium, or even a repeal. But Koster doesn't think the latter is very likely, based on his time serving in the Senate and seeing his colleagues deal with the issue.

Koster argues there are times when the death penalty is appropriate. He's fighting a lawsuit by inmates on death row. The suit claims a drug used for lethal injection causes undue pain, and therefore fits the criteria for cruel and unusual punishment.

Earlier coverage of Missouri lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Oregon Capital Punishment Debate Continues

Today's Oregonian publishes, "Maintain Gov. John Kitzhaber's death penalty moratorium on Gary Haugen."  It's written by David McNeil of Oregonians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty.

The Oregonian's editorial "Time to let Haugen die" (Aug. 7) provides a review of the Gary Haugen saga. I take exception, however, both to the title and to the conclusion. The title frames the issue -- inappropriately in my view -- as a question of Haugen's "right to die." Oregonians have compassionately provided such a right to those whose lives are being artificially prolonged and to terminal patients under carefully defined circumstances. Haugen falls into neither category, and framing the issue in this way obscures what is really at stake. A more frank and accurate title for the editorial would be "Oregon should kill Gary Haugen now."

So what is the rationale for this position?

The writer assumes that Judge Timothy Alexander's decision settles the issue legally. It doesn't. In reality, his opinion is based on an archaic 1833 U.S. Supreme Court doctrine that was rejected by that court in 1927. Because the doctrine, concerning the effectiveness of a governor's clemency order, found its way into decisions of the Oregon Supreme Court, Alexander felt compelled to follow it.

The issue is a serious one of constitutional law and deserves to be reconsidered by the Oregon Supreme Court. It's not "too bad" that the governor may appeal, and it's far from a "bizarre sideshow."

The writer also appears concerned about the cost to taxpayers of the governor pursuing such an appeal. That cost, however, is minuscule compared with the millions of taxpayer dollars spent every year pursuing death sentences, and it is probably substantially less than the cost of conducting Haugen's execution.

Like the rest of his companions on death row, Haugen was condemned to die for committing horrific murders. He's not a sympathetic figure. What distinguishes him from them, however, and the reason he's front-page news, is that he is "cool" with being executed. The bottom line for the editorial is a mere guess that it's "cool" with most Oregonians, too.

For me, and I expect for other readers, there's something unsettling both about giving Haugen so much publicity and about acceding to his death wish.

Earlier commentary from Oregon begins at the link.

More Commentary From Oregon

Today's Oregonian publishes the OpEd, "We shouldn't execute Gary Haugen until we finish the death penalty debate."  It's by Jeffrey Ellis, director of the Oregon Capital Resource Center.

It is not time to give Haugen "a date with the executioner," because we are not "allowing" Haugen to die. We are considering whether we want to continue killing people in all of our names. When we execute a human being, we do it in all of our names. It's our choice, not his. When Kitzhaber declared the moratorium, he did so consistent with the power granted to him by the people through the Oregon Constitution. The ruling by Marion County Circuit Judge Timothy Alexander takes that power from the people. His ruling would require us to execute someone who we all agreed was not even eligible for the death penalty. The Oregonian was wrong to endorse such a flawed and dangerous decision.

It's time to begin the death penalty debate in earnest. Haugen will need to wait until we Oregonians have finished our discussion at the ballot box.

"Governor right to stop executions, coalition says." is the Catholic Sentinel news report.

"A coalition opposing the death penalty says Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber used his powers appropriately when he declared a moratorium on executions last year.

The question arose last week when Circuit Court Judge Timothy Alexander ruled that an Oregon death row inmate can refuse the reprieve given by the governor.  

Oregonians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, which includes leaders of the Archdiocese of Portland, expressed disappointment with Alexander's decision and predicted it would be overturned on appeal to a higher court.

Oregonians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty advocates for life without the possibility of parole as a means of keeping the public safe and dealing with those convicted of aggravated murder.

"As a public policy, the death penalty fails on the basis that money is spent with the expectation that some good will be derived by the citizens of the state," says Ron Steiner, the organization's chairman and a member of Queen of Peace Parish in Salem. "There is no public good derived from an execution. The death penalty is a failed public policy and should be voted out by the people."

When Kitzhaber said he would not allow executions on his watch, he also called for a “long overdue debate on the death penalty” and urged the Legislature and the people to fix it.

"When all the facts are known, it becomes difficult to defend the death penalty system in Oregon," Steiner says.

Earlier coverage from Oregon begins at the link.

The Arkansas Moratorium

"State stymied on executions," is the title of John Lyon's post at the Arkansas News Bureau.

Attorney General Dustin McDaniel voiced frustration with the state Supreme Court last week over what he sees as resistance to the death penalty, but other legal experts say the problems the state has encountered in carrying out executions cannot be laid entirely at the court’s feet.

In an interview with Arkansas News Bureau business columnist Roby Brock, McDaniel said, “If the Supreme Court thinks … that executions should be declared unconstitutional, then they should do that. But instead, since the day I became attorney general they’ve simply erected one procedural hurdle after another to ensure that we can’t execute those who have committed the most heinous crimes in Arkansas.”

Numerous lawsuits and court rulings have prevented the state from executing any prisoners since 2005. Most recently, the state Supreme Court ruled last month that a 2009 law authorizing the director of the state Department of Correction to decide what chemicals are used in lethal injections gave the director too much discretion, in violation of the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of state government.

Gov. Mike Beebe has said he does not intend to schedule any executions until the Legislature passes a new law on lethal injections. That is expected to happen during the legislative session that starts in January.

Michael Johnson, a law professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, said states across the country have changed their lethal injection protocols in recent years, which has led to numerous legal challenges.

“I think the problems really have occurred over the last several years because of unavailability of drugs used in the protocols,” Johnson said.

And:

Johnson said the state Supreme Court struck down that law not because it found lethal injection unconstitutional but because it found that the law violated the state constitution’s provision mandating separation of powers.

“That’s pretty specific to the Arkansas Constitution, as opposed to something broader about the death penalty,” he said.

Earlier coverage of Arkansas lethal injection issues begins at the link.  The Arkansas Supreme Court ruling in Hobbs v. Jones is available in Adobe .pdf format.

Related posts are in the lethal injection index.

Kentucky to Change Lethal Injection Protocol

"Kentucky to change execution method from 3 drugs," is the AP report by Brett Barrouquere, via the Louisville Courier-Journal.  It's also available via the Lexington Herald-Leader.

Kentucky officials signaled Thursday they will change how prisoners are executed, opening the door to using a single drug instead of the current three-drug method that has been challenged by inmates who call it cruel and unusual punishment.

The Kentucky Justice Cabinet filed notice in Franklin Circuit Court that it would propose new regulations by July 24. The single-page motion does not say what changes will be made. The new method could be in place by late summer, allowing Kentucky to begin executions later this year.

Justice Cabinet spokeswoman Jennifer Brislin declined comment.

Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd in April gave Kentucky 90 days to make changes or face a trial to defend the three-drug method.

Shepherd said if Kentucky adopts a new regulation allowing for a one-drug execution — similar to what is done in Ohio, Arizona and other states — any claims of cruel and unusual punishment by the inmates “will be rendered moot.”

The battle over Kentucky’s lethal injection method has been going on for more than a year and a half. The judge’s ruling and Kentucky’s decision comes just months after the American Bar Association issued a report calling for a moratorium on executions in Kentucky, in part because of the number of cases overturned since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976.

At least seven states use a single drug to carry out executions. Three states — Idaho, Washington and South Dakota — give an option to use more than one drug.

In the last week, Missouri became the first state to switch to propofal, the same anesthetic that caused the overdose death of pop star Michael Jackson.

Kentucky’s current method calls for a single drug or combination of drugs. The state last used sodium thiopental, pancurionium bromide and potassium chloride, a combination similar to the one used by Georgia and some other states.

And:

To change the regulations, Kentucky officials must submit to the state a new execution method, which is made public. If a legislative subcommittee does not meet or does not find the regulation deficient within 30 days of publication, the regulation takes effect.

Earlier coverage of Kentucky lethal injection issues begins at the link.  Judge Shepherd's order to consider a single drug execution and an order on aspects of the state's Administrative Procedures Act are available in Adobe .pdf format.

Related posts are in the lethal injection category index.

Coverage of the ABA's Kentucky Death Penalty Assessment report is also available.

California to Explore Single Drug Lethal Injection Option

Today's Los Angeles Times reports, "Brown orders consideration of single-drug execution method."  It's by Maura Dolan.

Gov. Jerry Brown has ordered prison officials to consider a single-drug method of executing condemned inmates as the state appeals a court order that has blocked California from carrying out the death penalty.

Mention of the directive came in a notice of appeal filed Thursday by Atty. Gen. Kamala D. Harris seeking to counter a February ruling that halted a revised three-drug lethal injection method. The filing came just three days after certification of a November ballot measure that would offer voters the chance to repeal California's death penalty.

The legal filing said the state would reevaluate its position in favor of the three-drug method if "the drugs needed to implement the protocol have, in fact, become unavailable." The U.S. maker of one of the drugs has stopped manufacturing it.

"In the meantime, under the governor's direction, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation will also begin the process of considering alternative regulatory protocols, including a one-drug protocol, for carrying out the death penalty," the filing said.

A conservative law and order group sued the state last week to force it to implement a single-drug method of execution, a procedure used in nearly two dozen executions in other states.

A federal judge in 2006 halted executions in California after finding that inmates might experience excruciating pain under the state's three-drug procedure. California then revised its three-drug protocol, but a Marin County judge ruled in February that the state should have considered a single-drug method.

"Calif. makes new attempt to restart executions," is the title of Paul Elias' AP post, via Google News.  It's also available from the San Francisco Chronicle.

The governor's order was disclosed in an appeal of a Marin County judge's decision to toss out California's newly developed lethal injection regulations.

The new procedures called for prisoners to be put to death through the use of sodium thiopental, which may no longer be available in the United States, and two other drugs.

A federal judge in March barred the use of sodium thiopental purchased outside the country. There is no domestic maker of the product, and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has been ordered to turn over its foreign-bought drug to the Food and Drug Administration.

The FDA is considering whether to appeal the judge's order.

Lawyers for the state Department of Justice said Thursday they would reconsider the appeal if it becomes certain that sodium thiopental can no longer be used in California executions.

Marin County Judge Faye D'Opal in December invalidated the regulations because she said the state failed to explain why it chose the three-drug mixture over the one-drug method, which may have a lower risk of causing undo suffering to the inmate. The judge noted that the state's own expert said the one-drug method was superior.

The appeal says the state still supports the three-drug protocol, but that the governor had directed officials to explore the one-drug option.

"My administration is working to ensure that California's laws on capital punishment are upheld and carried out in conformity with our statutes," Brown said in a prepared statement Thursday.

A federal judge halted executions in 2006 and ordered prison officials to improve their lethal injection procedures or he was going to find California's lethal injection process caused unconstitutional suffering. Since then, the state has constructed a new death chamber at San Quentin Prison, developed new regulations and trained a new team to carry out executions.

U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg has scheduled a hearing on the federal case Sept. 15, making it clear that no executions will take place in California this year.

Earlier coverage of California lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Ruling in Kentucky Lethal Injection Challenge

"Judge: Ky. Must Consider Single-Drug Executions," is the AP report via WLWT-TV

A Kentucky judge has ordered the state to consider changing how it executes prisoners by lethal injection, saying it should look into using one drug instead of three.

Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd on Wednesday wrote that the state's three-drug method may no longer be necessary now that other states, including Ohio, have successfully used a single drug to execute condemned inmates.

The ruling comes 20 months after Shepherd halted all executions in the state after inmates challenged the three-drug method.

Shepherd's order gives Kentucky 90 days to study the changes. If the state sticks with a three-drug method, Shepherd wrote, the challenge by the inmates will be allowed to go to trial.

Judge Shepherd's order to consider a single drug execution and an order on aspects of the state's Administrative Procedures Act are available in Adobe .pdf format.

Earlier coverage of Kentucky lethal injection issues begins at the link.

I'll update as additional information becomes available.

Ohio's Death Penalty Moratorium Didn't Last Very Long

That's the title of a post this morning at the Atlantic Wire by Dashiell Bennett.

For the last several years, the state has been involved in legal battles, not over the idea of capital punishment, but the way it has been carried out. Several inmates sued over the procedures used after a botched 2009 execution when an inmate was stuck with a needle 18 times. The state has revised its method several times under accusations that it was unnecessarily painful, though a federal judge has accused the state of not following its own procedures properly. U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Frost halted all executions for six months last summer, but after allowing an execution in November, Frost once again criticized the officials for deviating from the procedures and ordered a halt to them until the process could be reviewed some more. However, he ruled two weeks ago that the Wiles execution could go forward.

The delay did hold up two other scheduled executions — one in January and one in February — but the gap of six months would hardly have been an unusual one. In most years during the last decade, the state has only seen three or four execution per year. However, there are now 12 prisoners with scheduled execution dates by the end of 2013 (more than any other state) showing no signs that Ohio plans to slow down the process. Two state Senators proposed a ban on the practice last month, shortly before Connecticut's became the fifth state in five years to abolish capital punishment, but the bill has not been brought to a vote.

"Ohio executes killer of teen," is Alan Johnson's post at the Columbus Dispatch on the execution of Mark Wiles this morning.

Wiles, 49, was executed at 10:42 a.m. at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility near Lucasville. It was Ohio’s first execution in five months because of a legal battle about the state’s lethal-injection procedures.

Wiles, who looked nervous and haggard after entering the death chamber, reportedly had spent a sleepless night.

As he lay on the gurney, a prison staff member removed his glasses at his request, so that he could read his last statement from a piece of paper held in front of his face.

"The love and support of my family has sustained and supported me throughout the years," he said. "I love you all.

"Since this needs to happen today, I hope my dying brings some solace and closure to the Klima family and their loved ones.

"The state of Ohio should not be in the business of killing its citizens.

"May God bless us all that fall short."

 Wiles' federal public-defender attorneys issued a statement, saying he "accepted the ultimate punishment with grace and dignity." However, they said he was not the "worst of the worst" for whom Ohio's death penalty was intended.

And:

The execution was the 47th in Ohio since capital punishment resumed in 1999.

Earlier coverage from Ohio begins at the link.

To date there have been 14 executions in the nation this year; a total of 1,291 post-Furman executions since 1977.

According to TDCJ, the next Texas execution is sceduled for April 26.  Five additional executions have already been scheduled for 2012.